Three newcomers each scored in double figures as the Carthage boys basketball team rolled Belton 60-41 on Friday night in the 72nd Carthage Boys Basketball Invitational.
The Tigers earned a spot in Saturday’s fifth-place game, which tips off at 11 a.m. in the main gymnasium. Carthage, the eighth seed, will face sixth seed Seneca.
Alex Martini scored 14 points, Patrick Carlton scored 13 and Tucker Downing added 10. The trio of football players watched from the bench in Tuesday’s season opener, played just three days after the conclusion of the football season.
Carthage coach Steve Ray said after Tuesday’s 76-41 loss to Joplin that it was too early to know when the handful of members of the football team would see the court, as they hadn’t played a “meaningful minute of basketball since June.”
Wednesday’s practice was a big help.
“We’re going to be a little bit of a work in progress,” Ray said Friday night. “Normally you get to the second game of the year and you’ve got a pretty good idea of your rotation. I was really proud of everybody that came in because they weren’t sure how many minutes they were going to get or when and they all came in and competed at a high level. We’ll figure it out. It might take a couple weeks but we’ll figure out a rotation that’s going to work for us.”
Martini, a 6-foot-7 junior, made his presence known early. He cleaned up a miss with a dunk in the first quarter that gave Carthage an eight-point lead.
The Tigers led 14-10 early in the second quarter but finished the half on a 16-4 run that started with a three pointer by Downing, a senior, with 5:58 left to play. He scored seven points in the quarter and Martini added five, including a three pointer. A free throw by sophomore Morgan Frisinger gave Carthage a 30-14 lead at the half.
“I thought we competed really hard,” Ray said. “We knew it was going to be a little rough in some stretches and it was. Defensively we’ve got a ways to go and offensively we’re going to be a work in progress for a bit but I was proud of how hard our guys played. I thought that was kind of the difference in the game. During that stretch we separated in the first half it was more effort than anything. I was really proud of the guys and how they competed.”
Martini and Carlton, a 6-3 sophomore, opened the third quarter with consecutive buckets to give the Tigers a 20-point lead. A Downing triple made it 37-16. A pair of Carlton baskets later in the quarter gave the Tigers a 22-point advantage.
Belton mounted a 12-2 run going into the fourth quarter that briefly made things interesting, as the Pirates pulled within 45-33 with 4:41 left in the game.
Carlton answered with a driving layup, and after another Belton basket, the Tigers went on a 13-3 run helped by a 7-for-8 performance at the free throw line in the fourth quarter.
Junior Lane Gall scored the final basket for Carthage with less than a minute remaining.
“We started the second half and challenged our guys to go get three stops,” Ray said. “That first two or three minutes out of halftime – especially in a game like that where we had a lead but they missed some shots and I’m saying Belton normally makes them – I knew they were going to make a run at us and we wanted to extend it. I thought some of our best basketball was right there in the third quarter.”
Junior Taris Jackson scored nine points for Carthage, Frisinger scored seven, junior Tyler Mueller scored four, Gall had two and Silas Templeman finished with one.
Championship games set
The Strafford girls earned the top seed in the Carthage Lady Tigers Basketball Invitational for a reason. The Lady Indians entered the 2018-19 season having won three-straight state championships.
On top of that, Strafford will put an 84-game winning streak on the line when it faces third seed West Plains at 3:30 p.m. Saturday for the tournament championship. The Zizzers beat second seed Mount Vernon 45-40 in a semifinal on Friday.
Strafford defeated Joplin 94-15 in the tournament opener, and defeated Har-Ber 72-40 in the semifinals.
Har-Ber and Mount Vernon will play at 12:30 p.m. Saturday in the third-place game. Carthage plays at 2 p.m. in the fifth-place game against either Hillcrest or Lamar. The seventh-place game is set for 11 a.m.
In the boys tournament, Joplin’s bid to defend it’s 2017 tournament title ended in Friday’s semifinals. The top-seeded Eagles lost 48-38 to fourth seed West Plains. The Zizzers will take on Rogers at 5 p.m. Saturday for the boys championship. Rogers, the third seed, beat second seed Nevada 49-47 in a semifinal on Thursday.
Joplin will play Nevada at 2 p.m. in the third-place game. That’s a rematch of last year’s finals. Following Carthage’s fifth-place game, Belton and Neosho will play for seventh place at 12:30 p.m.
