After winning their own sectionals, Chesterton (22-4) and Crown Point (22-1) travel to Michigan City for regional that tips off Saturday at 7 p.m.

Tom Keegan
Onwardtrojans.com

The Chesterton (22-4) and Crown Point (22-1) boys basketball squads arrive at the Michigan City regional Saturday for a 7 p.m. tipoff with eight-game winning streaks, a week removed from close sectional title games against DAC opponents that they had routed in the regular season, proof that past isn’t always prologue in high school basketball.
Playing at home without then-injured senior point guard Kingston Rhodes, Crown Point blasted the Trojans, 84-62 on Jan. 26, when 6-foot-7 senior Dikembe Shaw went off for 33 points, buried four 3-pointers and made 11 of 12 free throws.
Rhodes is back and his twin, Kaiden, is better a player for having run the team in his absence.
“The season’s a journey. It’s a long, long season with lots of ups, lots of downs,” Chesterton coach Marc Urban said, looking back on the first matchup. “I thought we were ready for that game, and whether we want to admit it or not, we probably were not. We were not ready for a lot of things because we really did not execute at all. We struggled to take care of the basketball. They had a lot to do with that. They pressured us really well and made us uncomfortable in a lot of ways and they played really well.”
In contrast, Chesterton couldn’t find a way to make Shaw uncomfortable shooting and paid the price.
Shaw, who signed with Division I Illinois-Chicago, is far from a one-man show and was one of five Bulldogs in double figures in the first game.
Michael Wilson, a 6-4 sophomore reserve, scored 12 points.
Mason Darrell, a 6-2 guard who signed with a D-1 Bellarmine, had 11, 6-3 Bryce Peters and 5-9 Kaiden Rhodes 10 apiece.
Junior Malachi Ransom (14 points) and senior Jaylon Watts (10) were the only Trojans in double figures.
Led by junior Tobias Ray’s 24 points, Chesterton advanced to the regional with a 59-50 win over a Valparaiso team it had trounced 75-33 in the regular season. Crown Point advanced by defeating Lake Central, 57-52.
“When you have to play three DAC teams in one week in a win-or-you-go-home tournament and all of them are good basketball teams, we probably declined in our execution, probably declined in doing our job at the defensive end,” Urban said. “Three games in five days against DAC teams. It’s a draining week. You’re tired. It’s a quick turnaround. But I feel that our toughness made us able to figure out a way to win and advance.”
Like Chesterton, Crown Point was the host of its sectional, but played just two games, crushing Hammond Central 76-24 and then defeating LC in a game that came down to the final minute. Shaw sprained his ankle early in the fourth quarter and did not return, but Urban said he expects him to play. Two weeks and a day earlier, the Bulldogs defeated Lake Central by 35 points.
Every game is different, even if the teams playing are the same.
“Just like with every game that we played, every game that we’ve won, every game that we’ve lost, there’s a lesson to be learned,” he said of the loss at Crown Point. “It was back in January, so I feel that we’re a better team than we were back then, but that doesn’t mean that it’s just going to happen. You have to show up. We have to make sure that we’re very tough in everything that we do because they’re very talented and they’re very deep and they’ve experienced a lot of winning over the years.”
An Indiana Mr. Basketball candidate, Shaw is averaging 19 points, six rebounds and more than two steals per game. Senior Logan Pokorney (14.4), sophomore Bradly Basila (13.5) and Watts (10.0) are scoring in double figures for Chesterton.