01/30/2026
BY JACK BULLOCK
ROBINSON - Friday night's championship game of the 54th annual Little Illini Conference Tournament for Lawrenceville and their fan base was like a movie that starts out confusing and slow but gets better the further along you go.

The Indians finally shifted into gear at the end of the second quarter as the plot of the film quickly turned into an exciting finish.

Trailing 20-14 with less than a minute left in the first half, the Indians got a drive to the basket for a slam dunk by senior Jayden Goff that was the spark that Lawrenceville needed.

This score triggered a game-changing 11-1 run that got the Indians back in control as they defeated Casey-Westfield 42-31 to grab the program's second consecutive LIC championship.

The defensive effort overshadowed an off night offensively for Coach Tad Shick, who's team is now 21-1 on the season.

Lawrenceville held C-W to just 29.7 percent shooting overall and forced eight turnovers to take home the title.

The winners did just enough offensively to post their eighth-consecutive victory

Teams that have off night's offensively, especially when facing good defensive teams, are able to get the stops they need to win.

The Indians did that on Friday night.

“When I took over the beginning of last year it was obvious that we had some skilled offensive players. We have about seven of them that can really score and know their roles. But if you want to win championships and if you want to get to where we want to be, you have to play defense,” said Coach Shick. “That is priority number one, every day. These last two games really has shown what we can do defensively.”

Lawrenceville was paced in scoring by senior floor general Zander Cessna with 16 points.

Noah Wilson, a senior forward for the Tribe, tossed in 15 for the win.

Wilson and Cessna's combined points equaled the Casey-Westfield final score.

Teammates senior Jacek Mickiewicz (six), senior Emery Ivers (three) and Goff (two) provided the margin of victory and the program's five Little Illini Conference tournament title.

Casey-Westfield had just four players score and only one, senior Fred Thomas, hit for double-figures with 10-points.

Junior guard Jackson High added eight-points for Coach Brannan while senior Leighton Jones scored seven and senior Jack Julius hit a pair of 3-pointers for six-points.

Those are the players who were penciled in the book that scored but the guy who only scored two on the night for Lawrenceville get the place rocking in the second quarter.

Casey-Westfield jumped out to a 13-5 lead after the first quarter, by far their best stretch of the contest.

Julius hit both of his long range shots in the opening frame, nailing down the first one from the top of the arc and the final one in the final minute from the left wing.

Jones connected from beyond the arc in the right corner and Thomas got his first bucket on the inside with 1:41 left.

The Warriors hit 5-of-10 in the opening eight minutes and were taking it to the Indians defensively.

Lawrenceville hit just 2-of-9 early and added three turnovers to their problems heading to the second quarter.

The Indians came up with a better performance beginning in the next scene.

Wilson scored on two separate inside moves and Cessna delivered on a drive to the basket as Lawrenceville trailed just 17-14 with 2:02 left in the quarter.

Thomas closed the C-W scoring with points in the paint and 1-of-2 free throws late.

But the Goff dunk, off of a nice cut to the basket, gave his team and the fans a big lift.

A basket by Wilson and a pair of free throws by Mickiewicz tied the score at 20-20 early in the second half.

Following a free throw made by Thomas, Lawrenceville scored the next seven points.

A 3-point bomb by Ivers, his only made shot of the game, was followed by Wilson getting loose in the lane and a steal and fast break by Cessna for a 27-21 Indians' advantage.

“We tried to use our length a little more in the second half by going to a 1-3-1 trap and when we go man, if we get beat on the trap we have the length and athletic ability to stop some easy buckets,” said Coach Shick. “What we did against Marshall (65-32 semifinal win) holding their two top players and what we did here in the second half was really special to me because we have worked so hard on our defense.”

Wilson closed the team's scoring in the third with an inbounds play where he took the ball down the left baseline for a two handed dunk.

Although he failed to put in a free throw for a three-point play, Lawrenceville was up by six.

High slapped a band-aid on the Casey-Westfield problems with a 3-pointer to end the quarter scoring at 29-26 Lawrenceville.

The problem needed a bigger bandage.

The Indians closed the deal and the championship with an 8-0 run to start the final frame.

A nice move to the basket by Mickiewicz off a Cessna assist started the quarter and 3-of-4 free throws by Wilson and Cessna pushed the lead to eight.

Cessna canned his first of two 3-pointers in the final minutes which forced a Casey-Westfield timeout at 37-26.

His second long range shot from the left wing produced a friendly bounce for a 40-29 lead.

A Thomas rebound basket followed by a tip-in by Wilson ended the scoring.

The Warriors couldn't overcome an 11-of-37 showing offensively, just 6-of-22 from inside the 3-point line.

The Indians won the rebounding battle by a 23-14 margin while hitting 16-of-34 from the field for (47.1 percent).

All other shortcomings (11-turnovers, 3-of-9 from the 3-point line) were equalized by the defensive effort.

“I told the kids at halftime that we've been here before. We're pretty good in the second half. I think our adjustment (switching defenses) threw Casey-Westfield off a little bit. I'm just proud of how we played defense tonight,” said Coach Shick.

MARSHALL 55, MT. CARMEL 48
For Marshall head coach Logan Eitel the importance of getting the ball to top scorer Peyton McGuire can't be overstated.

The 6-2 senior guard is the top scorer (19.1 p.p.g.) and when he gets going offensively, the Lions' success usually follows.

McGuire scored 24-points Friday night, leading Marshall to a 55-48 win over the Golden Aces.

The senior hit a pair of first half 3-pointers and canned 14-of-16 free throws in the victory to improve the Lions to 9-11 on the season.

Six-four senior forward Garrett Pugh added 15 to the totals while Tucker Osborn, a senior guard, scored 10 for Marshall.

They took advantage of Mt. Carmel foul problems and paraded to the foul line.

The Lions hit 26-of-35 from the stripe, as head coach Kyle Buss saw his team get whistled for 25 personal fouls.

“Peyton McGuire is such a great player. He and Garrett Pugh as well. Those two really came through for us tonight,” said Coach Eitel. “Peyton creates his own shot and he does all of our ball handling. Our role players did a really good job tonight.”

Mt. Carmel was led by junior guard Shain Meador with 25 points, with 16 of the points coming in the fourth quarter as the Aces rallied to get to within four-points in the final minutes.

Meador nailed down four 3-pointers in the final 3:40 of the game but the Aces fell short as they fell to fourth place in the tournament and 11-12 overall.

Senior Elliot Acree scored eight-points for MC while both senior Rhett Andrews, sophomores Wade Keepes and Elias Knapp scored four-points apiece.

Junior Lane Alka hit a big 3-pointer in the final minutes, his only score of the game, that made it 51-47 Marshall with just :39.5 left.

But the Lions managed to hold on for the win and made just enough free throws to survive for the third place victory.

Leading 27-17 at the half, Marshall got five more points from McGuire in the third quarter and a big 3-point shot from Osborn to take a 37-22 advantage to the final eight minutes.

The tale of the tape showed that neither team shot the ball well.

Marshall finished up 13-of-30 overall, 3-of-10 from the arc and they ended up with a 21-19 rebounding edge.

Mt. Carmel ended up 17-of-46, 6-of-21 from 3-point land and they took care of the ball a bit better than the Lions, 10 turnovers to 12 for Marshall.

“We made enough game winning plays, obviously it wasn't air tight. We went with a strategy to spread it out and not be aggressive. We normally rotate seven players but we were short two players tonight,” said Coach Eitel. “Zack Jones couldn't go tonight and Bryce Griguhn got hurt in the second quarter and couldn't come back in. We subbed in Reed Ramey tonight for a couple of minutes in the second quarter. This was his first varsity game this season. We played the whole second half with five players.”

They did so by getting off to fast starts in the beginning in each of the second, third and fourth quarters.

Head coach Randy Bishop is starting to see improvement for his young club, that took some major lumps in 2024-25 and early this season but are playing much better as of late.

Six-seven junior center Cruz Dunlap scored 23-points for Robinson, mostly battling inside, to lead the now 8-14 Maroons.

Six-six senior Andrew Sparks added 16-points and junior Gunner Hoalt and freshman Jetson Hoalt scored nine-points each.

“We have back-to-back wins. We've struggled but now we're starting to put things together,” said Coach Bishop. “I thought we played pretty well. This was a team effort.”

Richland County fell to 9-15 on the season for new head coach Dakotah Brown, who replaced Andrew Thomann who stepped down January 19th.

The Tigers were led by junior Cooper Hires with 14-points and sophomore Brody Redman with 12 on four made 3-pointers.

Senior Carsyn Ameter added 10 for Richland County.

Leading 13-10 heading to the second frame, Robinson went on a 10-0 run to push their lead to 23-10 with 3:21 left in the half.

In this time frame, Richland County failed to convert their first six shot attempts and were just 3-of-11 for the quarter.

Sparks scored twice to begin the run and finished with 10 of his points before halftime.

Dunlap added two additional scores, one on a nice assist by Jeston Hoalt to make it 27-12.

The one thing that kept the Tigers in the contest was the 3-point line.

Ameter hit a pair of 20-footers before Sparks tipped in a missed shot by Dunlap to beat the buzzer for an 11-point lead at the break.

As they did in the second quarter, Robinson came out of halftime and scored on three-consecutive trips.

Senior Mason Arnone scored to start the third quarter and Dunlap followed with a basket and then the two combined for 2-of-4 free throws.

Dunlap added to the scoring inside, once in transition on another assist by Hoalt and then he drove inside for a left hand lay up as the Maroons lead 42-30 heading to the final countdown.

Another fast start by Robinson doomed the Tigers in the final eight minutes.

Dunlap and Jetson Hoalt each scored twice, with the second basket by Hoalt on a floater in the paint, forced a Richland County timeout at 50-30 with 5:49 left.

The Tigers made five of their 10 3-point shots in the final minutes but they couldn't stop Robinson from scoring.

Dunlap scored on a fast break dunk on nice pass from Sparks.

Sparks added the exclamation point with a two-handed dunk in the final minute.

“We had some kids step up for us tonight,” said Coach Bishop. “We always talk about the first three minutes (of the quarter).”

Richland County hit just 17-of-55 overall (30.9 percent) and 10-of-27 from downtown.

Coach Bishop's club did their harm on the inside of the Tigers' defense, hitting 28-of-36 shots from two-point range (77.7 percent) with just 1-of-10 from the arc.

Robinson out-rebounded the Tigers 35-20 while overcoming their 11-turnovers.

“It (bench) enables us to give our big kids some rest and the two freshmen I got can play (Hoalt, Felix Reynolds) can play,” said Coach Bishop. “The learning process is starting to come together. We're going to be okay in the future. I'm happy that we're improving like we are.”