Mercy! Logan Pokorney sizzles with 20 first-half points and Chesterton makes 13 3-pointers in 64-24 blowout of younger, smaller Andrean squad

Tom Keegan
Onwardtrojans.com

One swished 3-pointer at a time, Chesterton senior Logan Pokorney shot visiting Andrean out of contention in a blink, so the only remaining suspense involved whether he could score more points in the game than the 59ers.
By halftime of the 64-24 victory played with a running clock the entire fourth quarter, Pokorney had made six 3-pointers and scored 20 points and the Trojans led 40-17. Chesterton took a 14-0 lead before Andrean scored its first bucket with 3:48 left in the first quarter.
Those tracking the individual scorers on the new scoreboard hovering above center court might have noticed that Pokorney was outscoring the younger, smaller 59ers the entire first half.
Surely, he would outscore them for the night. One problem: He had no interest in doing so or in eclipsing his career high of 24 points, both of which he could have accomplished without playing the final period.
“I try to approach every game the same way,” Pokoroney said afterward. “If I’m looking to score, I’m not really approaching it the right way.”
What is the right way?
“Play for my teammates before I play for myself,” he said. “Obviously, at times, you’re going to have to score. But if I’m chasing points instead of a win tonight, I’m not playing the right way.”
Pokorney made a trio of 3-pointers in the first quarter, three more in the second, and didn’t attempt any in his limited second-half minutes. He made 6 of 8 3-pointers in the first half and finished the game with 20 points.
“I’m always working on it. I work on my shot every day,” Pokorney said. “If there is something wrong with my shot, Coach (Marc) Urban is always there to tweak it and keep it the same way.”
Pokorney is shooting .452 from 3 and averages 15.7 points per game for the Trojans (9-2), who open DAC play Saturday night at Merrillville.
More than working on his shot daily contributes to the high percentage.
“I keep trying to take the right ones,” he said.
The entire team does a strong job at that, including junior point guard Tobias Ray, who has a .519 3-point percentage.
Moving the ball rapidly to create open shots all night, the Trojans made a season-high 13 3-pointers, six from the bench. Cooper Huwig (three), Malachi Ransom (two) and Tommy Kostbade (one) came off the bench to drain shots and Bradly Basila made one and was the only one to join Pokorney in scoring in double figures with 13 points.
Urban was particularly pleased that half of the 10 first-half 3-pointers came after point touches.
“When the ball gets moving, we make more of them,” Urban said.
Throughout the game, the Trojans defended every bit as well as they shot throughout the game. Andrean opened three of the four periods with a scoring drought that lasted longer than four minutes.
“I felt that we did a really good job of taking away the things that we wanted to take away, which is a good sign that you learned that lesson,” Urban said.
Sophomore Jordan Susdorf led the 59ers with six points, all in the first half of a game in which Andrean was limited to seven second-half points.
The Trojans playing with so much intensity and togetherness with such a big lead was not lost on their coach.
“I thought that we did not change our demeanor from the tip to the very end,” Urban said. “I felt that we stayed consistent. To me that’s a good sign. It’s encouraging that, all right, maybe we’ve learned some things.”
Avoiding the temptation to play to the scoreboard and take the foot off the gas isn’t always as easy as Chesterton made it look Wednesday.
“We’ve had some big leads at halftime and I thought we kind of got cute and started point hunting,” Urban said. “I told them at halftime, nobody knows how many you scored at Elkhart. No one knows what you scored at Morton, but they do know you lost to Bloomington North and they know you lost to Evansville North. So just keep generating great shots together.”
They did that throughout the game and Pokorney had no problem with the shots not being generated for him after halftime.
“I’ve always said his weapon is he has the ability to shoot, and that obviously puts a lot of pressure on the defense,” Urban said of Pokorney. “But he’s getting better at putting it on the floor. When we get into these DAC games, people are going to start to take things away, but where he doesn’t necessarily have to score 20 in the first half to be effective, he can draw a lot of people with that and that might open up the next piece or two for him.”