We saw a great show …

By Tom Wheeler

Monday night I took my wife Lynda and daughter Dhana to the best show I have seen in a long time. We traveled to downtown Ina and made a stop a Jim “Hummer” Waugh gymnasium to see Rend Lake College take on John A Logan College in a great college basketball contest.

Two of my favorite southern Illinois athletes were coaching the two teams. Benton native Randy House took time off from his insurance business to coach the Warriors to a 87-64 win as the Warriors raised their record to 13-2 (6-2 in the conference) and maintained their ranking as the number 8 team in the nation in their division. This was also the first victory for House over arch rival Logan in his three years of coaching, losing four games, two by one point and another by 2 points.

Logan’s coach in his first year as the “main man” Kyle Smithpeters led Harrisburg to an undefeated football state championship as a quarterback, (and SIU legend Carl Mauck still tells him he played the wrong sport in college), played basketball at Harrisburg JC (SE Illinois College) where he led his team to a final four berth and a two year record of 55-6. Kyle then played two years at SIU (like House) as his team won two Missouri Valley Championships.

He returned to Logan after a year with Paul Lusk at Missouri State and felt very comfortable with the move in following Mark Imhoff who he had served under for four years.
Logan came into the Monday night game after a tough loss to Vincennes on Saturday afternoon while the Warriors had defeated Wabash Valley on the same day. Rend Lake roared out to a ten point half time lead and never looked back behind double figure scoring of Noel Allen 15, (Guttenburg, NJ), Cortez Macklin 14, (Louisville, KY) and Woodlawns Dawson Verhines with 12.

Logan was led in scoring by Marion’s Aaron Adeoye, 15 as the only player in double figures while our nephew Connor wheeler was close with 9 points. The Vols weren’t bad from the field shooting42% but were killed on the boards 41-33 (RLC’s Bronson Verhines, had 14) and Logan had an uncharacteristic 16 turnovers.

There are many reasons this was such a great game:  Very well played, very well officiated and a very enthusiastic crowd. Both teams played hard, it wasn’t a game for the weak but it also wasn’t a game full of cheap shots and whining to the officials, (again this is a compliment to the two coaching staffs).

As Mitch Haskin’s assistant for six years at RLC, I watched a lot of games in Hummer Gym but not sure I ever saw two teams as unselfish as these two Monday night. I also loved how Randy and Kyle were involved in a chess match, changing defenses, changing match-ups, changing the tempo of the game. Midway in the first half I started thinking, who was the starters in this game, usually a team falls back a little when starters are out, but both teams have great benches and neither has a “five” best, again compliments to both staff for convincing guys to play their roles.

Another major reason I will take my family back to see these two squads play is because of the local players we were all familiar with. Playing for Logan was DuQuoin’s Connor Wheeler, Marion’s Aaron Adeoye, Herrin’s Jamie Jones (who hit a couple 3’s),Murpysboro’s Pierre House and Carterville’s Drew Bonner.

Coach House played the Verhines brothers of Woodlawn, Coery Ayala of Massac County and the Trico duo of Jesse Smith (whose father Jackie played at RLC) and Dennis Froemling (who brought the crowd to their feet with a long three).

Yes, it was a great show and we plan to be back to another one, in fact Benton basketball authority Kenny Irvin was there, doesn’t that tell you something??