7th Grade Boys Basketball Finished Their Season with a Great Win over Northeast Dubois in the Holy Trinity Tourney for 3rd Place The Forest Park 7th Grade Boys Basketball Team had their final games of the season on Saturday morning at the Holy Trinity Tournament. After the snow storm that Dubois County got, the Rangers had not been in the gym for a week, but finally were able to practice on Thursday. After two days of practice on Thursday and Friday, Coach Hochgesang was excited to see the boys compete for the last time for him on Saturday. FP was tasked with playing Holy Trinity in the first round of the tourney. The Rangers had a very tough start to this 9am game vs the home team Holy Trinity. FP found it very hard to put the basketball in the hoop in the first half, and sadly found themselves down 3-20 in the first half. Coach Hochgesang and Coach Nalley tried to stay positive during their halftime speech saying, "if Holy Trinity can do that to us in the first half, that means we can do the same thing to them in the second half." The Rangers came out with intensity and scored 10 points in the third quarter, but at that time, it was too late for FP to come back from their deficit. The Rangers ended up losing 37-19 to Holy Trinity. FP only had 7 turnovers but shot 6/14 from the free throw line. Scoring vs Holy Trinity : Declan Nord : 5 points (1/2 FTs) Blake Morrison : 5 points (one 3-pointer, 2/6 FTs) Zander Reyling-Schwartz : 3 points (one 3-pointer) Michael Christmas : 3 points (1/2 FTs) Cash Lueken : 2 points (2/4 FTs) The Rangers were then tasked at playing Northeast Dubois for the 3rd time this season for the 3rd place game. This game started well for the Jeeps as they had a 10-4 lead over the Rangers after the 1st quarter. Coach Hochgesang pepped up his team and asked for them to give it their all for this final game. The Rangers then outscored the Jeeps in the second quarter 14-5 to give FP the 18-15 lead. The Rangers were able to play intense defense to make the Jeeps make bad decisions. FP was then able to get fastbreak points and two threes in that 2nd quarter to give them the spark they needed. This game was far from over though and the Rangers knew this. After the third quarter the lead for the Rangers stayed the same with them up 25-22 going into the final 6 minutes of their 7th grade season. The 4th quarter came and it was an interesting one. The Rangers did not score a 2-point basket the whole final quarter. The Rangers went 6/8 from the free throw line and had a made three from Cash Lueken. FP was up 1 point with a little over a minute to go and the Rangers took a rushed 3-point attempt. The Jeeps were then able to go down the court and score after multiple possessions of offensive rebounds for ND to give them a 1 point lead. After multiple jump-ball scenarios, the Jeeps had the ball with 7 seconds left in the game and a 1 point lead. The Rangers did a great job with pressure and forced a turnover. Cash Lueken was able to corral the ball and dribble up to a deep three point shot with 4 seconds left, not knowing the time left, Cash put up the shot but was left short. Cooper Wehr was in perfect position to grab the offensive rebound and was then fouled with no time on the clock. After discussion between the two refs, they decided it was a foul and Cooper was going to get 2 free throws to win the game. Cooper stepped to the line with the upmost confidence and sank the first free throw to tie the game, nothing but net. Cooper then shot the second free throw and gave the crowd some scares as it bounced on the rim a few times and fell through. The Ranger teammates rushed to the floor to cheer on their teammate for winning them the game. The Rangers beat the Jeeps 34-33 to end their season! Scoring vs Northeast Dubois : Blake Morrison : 11 points (two 3-pointers, 3/6 FTs) Michael Christmas : 10 points (2/4 FTs) Cash Lueken : 6 points (two big 3-pointers) Zander Reyling-Schwartz : 5 points (1/2 FTs and amazing defense) Cooper Wehr : 2 GAME WINNING POINTS (2/2 FTs) This 7th Grade Boys Basketball group may have not had the best record, but they finished the season 6-15 and 4-2 for the B team. Coach Hochgesang's motto for this whole season was "Get Better Each and Every Day," and Coach believes that this group of boys did get better no matter what their record showed. Congratulate the boys on a hard-fought season and wish them luck in their Spring sports.