North Takes Civil War Trophy In South’s Season Opener Friday

Nick Gonnella

Greensburg — The first Civil War showdown between the North Decatur and South Decatur boys basketball teams went to the Chargers Friday night, 63-37 in the Mid Hoosier Conference opener for both teams.

The home team opened a 17-8 lead behind the shooting duo of junior Tyler Brown and senior Alex Pulskamp. Brown scored all 10 of his first-half points in the first quarter, while Pulskamp’s eight pre-break points also came in the first.

“That was the key for us tonight,” said North head coach Kyle Nobbe of the duo’s output, “our energy coming out, and especially for Tyler. He hasn’t been shooting the ball in well the first two games. He came in quite a bit in the mornings, getting extra shots in. It paid off for him early. That was big. We’re going to keep going to him, and he has to be our catalyst. He has to control the paint for us, offensively and the floor.”

Pulskamp finished the night with 16 points. He and Isaac Loechle, who led all scorers with 18 points, each went 6-for-6 from the foul line.

Brown scored 10 points, Justin Huber scored six, Quentin Dieckmann added five and Thomas Speer scored four. Derek Moore and Eric Lusk scored two apiece. Brown and Loechle each hit a pair of 3-pointers. Speer added 10 rebounds.

North, which improves to 2-1 with the win, led 36-13 at the half.

Nobbe saw an eager but anxious Charger team turn over the ball 11 times in the first half.

“Our kids wanted to come out and battle for it,” said Nobbe of the Civil War trophy. “They wanted to fight for it.”

The Chargers outrebounded South 35-23, but turned over the ball 17 times. Of the 11 first-half turnovers, eight were in transition.

“It’s still early in the season, and obviously we see a lot of things we can really improve on,” said Nobbe. “We have to continue to get better as far as taking care of the ball. We’re going to have to work on it all year long, not turning the ball over and being more patient offensively in the half court.”

South found a rhythm in the second half as the Cougars outscored North 14-10.

First-year South head coach Joe Hartwell noticed his team’s improvement after the break.

“We never ran our offense in the first half,” said Hartwell. “We were rushing too much. We were happy just to get a shot off. The second half, we slowed down. We made the correct passes, we set good screens and we made good cuts.”

Mote led South with 12 points, including seven in the third quarter and three in the fourth. Junior Junior Alex Helms scored nine, including seven in the third quarter. Jordan AmRhein added six, while senior Taylor Wilkerson and Derek Taylor each scored three. Blake Moore and Chris Dickson each added two.

South shot 14-of-39 overall.



Scoring by Quarters:

SD - 8 5 14 10 -- 37

ND - 21 15 10 17 -- 63



The North junior varsity team beat South 42-22 in the first game. For the Chargers, John Hammersmith and Paul Badgley each scored nine points, while Jesse Elsner and Jeremy Meyer scores six apiece. Kevin Geis, Jason Kirchhoff and Andrew Means scored four each, while Ben Harrison added two.

For the Cougars, Sam Johnson led South with seven points. Michael England scored six, Josh Schwering tallied five, Kyle Cunningham scored four, and Tyler Dust added two.

North is not slated to play again until next Friday as the Chargers travel to Jac-Cen-Del for a non-conference game, after the 6 p.m. junior varsity game.

South, after a late start to the season, hits the court tonight as the Cougars host Rising Sun following the 6 p.m. junior varsity contest.

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