Taylor aims at conference title as they prepare for ranked Peru

Posted: Thursday, January 21, 2010 7:00 am | Updated: 6:22 pm, Wed Jan 20, 2010.

By Peter Adelsen staff writer padelsen@kokomoperspective.com | 0 comments

Coming off a weekend where they won their first Howard County Tournament championship in ten years, the Taylor High School Titans are looking for more hardware in the Mid-Indiana Conference championship.

It will not be easy though as the Titans (7-4, 2-1 MIC) welcome the Peru High School Tigers (11-1, 2-0 MIC), the third-ranked team in class 2A, to their home court Friday at 7:30 p.m.

“It’s our shot at the conference,” Taylor coach Jeff Fisher said. “If we want a shot, we’re going to have to beat Peru and it’s nice having them at home.”

The Taylor Titans are optimistic about Friday’s game because of the way the team has played within the past two weekends.

Two weeks ago, the Titans had a shot at taking the conference lead with a tough loss at conference-leader Hamilton Heights High School losing 46-51 after leading after every quarter break. The following night, the Titans took now 13-0 Mississinewa High School Indians (3A-8) to overtime in what was that team’s closest game so far this year.

Then last weekend, the Titans defeated Western High School 75-67 to make it to the Howard County Tournament final where they defeated Eastern High School 72-59.

“I think we’ve played well for the last two weekends,” Fisher said. “We’re fortunate to get wins over two good teams this weekend in the county tournament. I think we need to keep doing what we’ve been doing, especially offensively this weekend coming up against Peru.”

Peru has won 10 games in a row, including wins over Eastern, Marion, Kokomo and Maconaquah twice. The Tigers’ average margin of victory is 21.4 points.

“What’s tough about Peru is they are a very difficult defense to play against,” he said. “We’ll have to handle their switching man-to-man defense and their match-up zone and we’ll have to be able to not turn the ball over against that and get the shot we want is going to be important. I think our interior defense has to do well and we have to limit them to only one shot and those would be keys for us on the defensive end.”

In Peru’s last game against Maconaquah, the Braves decided to hold the ball for more than four minutes in the second quarter to disrupt the Peru Tigers. In the quarter, the Tigers scored four points and the Braves were held scoreless.

“That was the way Maconaquah attacked their defense by trying to give themselves a chance and that’s not a bad idea, but we won’t do it that way,” Fisher said.

Peru defeated Maconaquah 39-22. Peru senior Wes Zimmerman led the team in scoring with 15 points.

For the Titans, seniors Reomey Northington, Drake Herr and Cody Hinton have been impressive as of late. Against Western in the tournament, Northington scored 17, Herr scored 23 and Hinton added 17 points. In the championship against Eastern, Northington scored 22, Herr scored 13 and Hinton scored 4.

“Cody Hinton for the past couple weekend has kind of been our X-factor,” he said. “He’s kind of been the guy that has really scored well for us from the perimeter and gives us another dimension offensively.”

Other games Friday (7:30 p.m. starts):

Kokomo (8-3, 3-0 NCC) at Frankfort (5-6)

Maconaquah (4-6, 0-3 MIC) at Western (7-5, 2-1 MIC)

Hamilton Heights (9-3, 3-0 MIC) at Eastern (6-4, 1-2 MIC)

Lewis Cass (2-8, 0-2 MIC) at Northwestern (5-5, 1-2 MIC)

Saturday’s games (7:30 p.m. starts, unless otherwise noted):

Tipton (8-1) at Kokomo (8-3, 3-0 NCC)

Tri-Central (6-7) at Western (7-5, 2-1 MIC)

Clinton Central (1-8) at Taylor (7-4, 2-1 MIC)

Eastern (6-4, 1-2 MIC) at Northfield (4-6)

Hamilton Heights (9-3, 3-0 MIC) at Sheridan (3-7)

Lewis Cass (2-8, 0-2 MIC) at Delphi (5-3)

Maconaquah (4-6, 0-3 MIC) at Logansport (11-1, 2-0 NCC), 8 p.m.