Week three is in the books with games played at Turnstone’s Plassman Athletic Center this week during the Summit Summer League.
Plenty of more people broke through as top performers and we saw a certain uptick all around in the league this week as Josh Deming coached his team to a 2-0 mark with wins over Team Abram and Team Durnell.
For the uninitiated, each week the teams in the league will change and players will play with different teammates under different coaches. The games are played in two 20-minute halves with a 35-shot clock and an Elam Ending to close the games out. What is the Elam Ending? The clock in the second half is stopped at two minutes and seven points is added to the winning team’s score; that total becomes the target score that needs to be hit to achieve victory.
So what went down in Week 3 that you should know about?
A BIG SHOOTER EMERGES
While the race to be the best player in the league this week had several twists with big games from Isaiah King (Fort Wayne Hawks), Colt Kirkpatrick (Central Noble), Mack Welker (Homestead) and Michael Raudenbush (Homestead), court one saw a burgeoning potential star in Lakeland senior Justin Carlson.
The Lakeland senior has been a steady presence throughout the first two weeks but something just clicked for him in week two despite not getting a win with Team Durnell who fell in a next-basket-wins situation against Team Prokop before a lopsided loss to Team Deming.
But no matter what was happening, Carlson was shining.
Against Team Prokop to open the night on Turnstone Court 1, Carlson finished with 19 points and four assists. In the Elam Ending time, down 67-64 in a race to 69 points as the target score, Carlson pulled up from the top of the key to bury his fourth three pointer of the game and tie it at 67. His shots were huge throughout the game, both from deep and his post play jump hook game looking crisp.
In game two, Carlson upped himself scoring 21 points as the significant leading scorer from Team Durnell. Carlson buried three triples in this one though and continued to display versatility getting downhill, hitting pull-ups and being a bully around the rim. With Team Durnell trailing 50-22 at halftime. Carlson opened up the second half giving his team a big boost with five straight points that helped Team Durnell start the half on a 10-0 run. One of those shots was one of his range showing threes and the other came off a rebound, get out and go and pull-up midrange from the free throw line.
Carlson also tallied four steals in the second game loss, getting heavily into transition passing lanes and doing his best to disrupt what was a heavy Team Deming momentum.
A NOBLE COUNTY NIGHT
The East Noble duo of Nathan Bowker and Ryker Quake had teamed up in the past during this year’s Summit Summer League but had seen a lot of time in separate lineups, not with a lot of time on the court together. That changed this week and they thrived.
In Team Prokop’s win over Team Durnell, Bowker and Quake connected a lot and it showed how seamlessly they may be able to play together this winter. They also seemed to take some fun joy in beating their high school coach on Wednesday night.
Bowker, the league’s assist leader, tallied eight in the game including several to Quake who had his best offensive performance of the league at times. Bowker finished with 16 points to go with his assists while Quake had 11 points and four assists in the game one victory for Team Prokop.
After team Prokop had led much of the game, Team Durnell pulled ahead before the Elam Ending, 62-59. But the East Noble duo bookended the Elam time, starting with a Quake transition three off a pass from Parker Reed (Garrett) to tie the game. Another late three off an Owen Prater (Rochester) assist from Quake pushed Prokop ahead to 67-64 in the race to 69 points. That race ended on a Bowker basket at the rim.
Meanwhile, over on Team Deming, it was a banner week for Central Noble’s Colt Kirkpatrick.
While you could say that plenty of guys broke out in each of the three weeks, a performance like Wednesday from Kirkpatrick is a big wake up call too. While Kirkpatrick is at Central Noble as a senior, he has spent the rest of his high school career playing for the Noble Whitley Warriors on the same homeschool circuit where Summit Summer League standouts Isaiah King and Trevon Maley play for the Fort Wayne Hawks.
Kirkpatrick scored 15 points and was crucial on all levels offensively in a game one win over Team Abram and his consistency in game two was fantastic. As Team Deming steamrolled Team Durnell, Kirkpatrick’s third straight make in the first half pushed Team Deming’s lead to a game high 30 points at 45-15. Kirkpatrick then missed his next shot but finished the game hitting his last four shots (six if you include free throws) and finished 9-of-12 from the field in the win. He scored a game high 23 points in the win and certainly asserted himself after a tweaked ankle kept him out part of week two.
Check back Tuesday for a preview of the final week of the 2024 Summer League, then again next Thursday as we wrap up the league with some of Bounce’s Unofficial awards for the league participants.
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