By RICHIE HALL
ARCADIA – It was starting to seem like old times in the Hamilton Heights gym on Wednesday night.
A large crowd was there to root on the Huskies as they played their regular-season finale against Harrison. Those fans not only got to cheer about an exciting win for Heights, 65-62 over the Raiders, but they also got to see some history as well.
Huskies senior Gus Etchison scored his 2,000th point during the opening minutes of the third quarter. Etchison got to that magic number on a putback. With that basket, he joined an ultra-exclusive club. The Western Michigan commit is only the third Hamilton County basketball player to reach 2,000 points, following the lead of Carmel’s fabulous Shepherd boys, Dave and Billy.
“That’s a great accomplishment for Gus,” said Heights coach Chad Ballenger. “As I keep telling him, team success leads to individual success. He’s buying into that. We need to have team success to help him get to his individual success.”
“All those individual goals and stuff and success, it’s awesome and everything,” said Etchison. “But at the end of the day, all I really want is just that sectional championship, because I haven’t experienced that yet.”
Etchison said he wants to win the sectional “for the school and just for the whole community, because we deserve that after a lot of the stuff that all of us on the basketball team” has gone through.
“All the individual success is awesome and stuff, but at the end of the day, I’m just here to get that sectional championship,” said Etchison.
The Huskies will go into the sectional on a four-game win streak, but they had to work to get that fourth consecutive victory. Harrison skipped out to a 6-0 lead, and would not trail for most of the first half. Heights worked its way back to a 10-10 tie, with Isaac Wilson’s 3-pointer knotting the score up. But the Raiders went on an 11-2 run, which finished with sophomore Ben Henderson making a four-point play with 1:11 left. Henderson’s 3-pointer and foul shot put the Raiders up 21-12.
Wilson drained another 3 before the quarter ended, getting the Huskies within 21-15. Luke Carroll opened the second period by making two foul shots, and Isaac Tuma added another free throw to make it a 6-0 run.
A layin by Max Jacobsen gave Harrison a 25-21 lead. Then Heights took over, making its own 11-2 run that would stretch into halftime. Tillman Etchison started it with a triple, then Carroll’s layin put the Huskies in front for the first time, 26-25. Gus Etchison added a layin, Noah Linville hit two free throws, and another layin from Gus Etchison finished the half and gave the Huskies a 32-27 lead.
“I think we really started spreading them out more,” said Gus Etchison. “We got in our five-out formation. Instead of having guys on the post, we just spread them out.”
“We really locked in defensively,” said Ballenger. “It was a big key to the game. Their pace and who they play, a really good schedule, and we always know when we play them that we have to get adjusted because they cut so hard and play so hard. So, we did. It took us that first quarter, a little bit, to see that and realize it. And in the second quarter, I thought we did a great job.”
The Huskies were moving the ball exceptionally well. Gus Etchison said that after Heights suffered a close loss to Western earlier in the month, the players got together and had a conversation about trusting each other more.
“We just said we needed to start trusting each other and making that extra pass,” said Etchison. “Instead of having a good shot, make it a great shot.”
The third quarter opened with a 3-pointer by Harrison’s Bryant Smith, and that was followed by Etchison’s history-making putback. Later, Smith drained another 3 to put the Raiders up 37-36, the first of eight lead changes during the period.
Jacobsen’s 3 late in the quarter gave Harrison its last lead of the game at 46-45. Etchison promptly erased that with a layin. Then, after a Raiders’ timeout with 2.3 seconds left, Gus threw in a last-second 3-pointer, putting the Huskies up 50-46 going into the fourth.
Heights never trailed in that closing quarter. Lucas Letsinger expanded the lead to 53-48 with his own triple. Later, two Etchison free throws and a putback from Wilson gave the Huskies their largest lead, at 57-51. Harrison would cut that advantage down to 61-60 with under a minute to go, but Carroll stepped up for Heights in those final seconds, scoring on a layin, then clinching the game by making two free throws with 4.4 seconds left.
“That was huge,” said Ballenger. “That’s huge to step up there in that pressure situation. Our seniors also were able to contribute.”
Etchison finished the game with 30 points, including four 3-pointers, while Wilson scored 10 points. Carroll collected seven rebounds. Smith led the Raiders with 23 points.
“All the seniors were able to contribute,” said Ballenger. “Drew Pennington came in and played solid, and Blake Stevens got a rebound and a blocked shot. Lucas and Isaac and Gus and Noah Linville have been our staples. They’ve been playing a lot of minutes.
“Linville is so underrated. He handles the ball, he’s a point guard. He’s shooting like 90-some percent from the free-throw line. His assist to turnover ratio is crazy. And he doesn’t get all the credit all the time because he doesn’t always score a lot.”
Ballenger called Linville one of the team’s best defenders.
“I’m pleased for him, and he wants to play at the next level,” said Ballenger. “He’s going to be able to. He’s going to be able to play at that next level. He’s really done a good job the last few weeks for us.”
The Huskies finished the regular season 15-4 and will play Yorktown Tuesday in the first game of Sectional 24 at New Castle.
HAMILTON HEIGHTS 65, HARRISON 62
Heights FG FT TP PF
Gus Etchison 12-23 2-2 30 1
Noah Linville 0-1 2-2 2 3
Luke Carroll 2-4 4-4 8 4
Isaac Wilson 4-7 0-0 10 3
Lucas Letsinger 3-8 0-0 7 0
Isaac Tuma 2-2 1-2 5 2
Drew Pennington 0-1 0-0 0 0
Tillman Etchison 1-2 0-0 3 1
Blake Stevens 0-0 0-0 0 0
Totals 24-48 9-10 65 14
Score by Quarters
Harrison 21 6 19 16 – 62
Heights 15 17 18 15 – 65
Heights 3-point shooting (8-22) G. Etchison 4-9, Wilson 2-4, Letsinger 1-4, T. Etchison 1-2, Linville 0-1, Carroll 0-1, Pennington 0-1.
Heights rebounds (20) Carroll 7, G. Etchison 4, Wilson 4, Letsinger 2, Tuma 1, T. Etchison 1, Stevens 1.