Recognizing our area basketball teams' "Hustle Guys"
The end of the basketball seasonn brings with it all the postseason accolades.
Friday the Greene County Daily World announced the six finalists for the 2015-16 GCDW Player of the Year.
The POY will be named sometime next week.
Saturday the 10-man GCDW All-Area team was named.
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In addition to the "official" awards, i.e. Player of the Year finalists and the All-Area team, I have an "unofficial" list of players I'd like to take this time and space to recognize:
The 2015-16 Greene County Daily World "All-Hustle" team.
These are players who universally bring a much-needed element of toughness and "hustle" to their respective teams. Each of these five players have had a huge impact in the biggest games their teams have played.
And they're pretty good basketball players to boot!
Without further ado, here are five guys every coach would like to have on the floor:
Chris Gilmore, Bloomfield -- Gilmore epitomizes the elements of toughness and hustle I referred to above. As mentioned earlier Gilmore came up huge in the Seymour Semistate against West Washington. And I'll never forget the toughness Gilmore displayed in the championship game of the Greene County Invitational, scoring 12 points on a perfect 5 of 5 from the field in a 28-27 last-second loss to Linton-Stockton. In that game Gilmore was equally effective scoring outside and inside, knocking down both his 3-point attempts and taking the ball inside aggressively the rest of the night.
The GCI title game gives me a great lead-in to my next two "All-Hustle" selections - Linton-Stockton's Pierce Jackson and Tyler Meurer.
Both these guys came up huge in the GCI final. More importantly, they came up even bigger in the sectional championship win over South Knox.
In the GCI final against Bloomfield, Jackson came up with the biggest rebound of the game.
Trailing 27-23, he tracked down an offensive rebound and was fouled on the putback. The senior sank both free throws to trim the Cardinals lead in half with 1:08 to play.
Not only is Pierce one of the toughest, most hustling son-of-a-guns I've seen on the floor, he knocks down his freebies when it counts.
And we haven't even mentioned his game-winning, last-second 3-pointer at the end of the fifth overtime in the sectional final against South Knox, handing the Miners a 43-40 win and an unprecedented fourth straight sectional crown.
Which wouldn't have had a chance to even happen without Tyler Meurer's Play of the Year with 28 seconds left in the fourth overtime of the sectional final.
After Josh Dieball converted two at the stripe to pull the Miners within two, Meurer's unbelievable strip and steal on the ensuing inbounds tied the game and set the stage for the final fireworks.
Meurer, a junior, didn't even play basketball as a sophomore. But he worked his way into the rotation and wound up as one of the Miners' three double-figure scorers.
Our next "All-Hustle" selection is Eastern Greene's Caleb Hamilton.
Hamilton was the Thunderbirds' second leading scorer and the team's leading rebounder as a sophomore. He scored at a 10.8 clip and corralled 5.1 rebounds per outing.
The hard-nosed sophomore brought a much-needed element of toughness, aggressiveness and hustle to the Thunderbirds.
Undersized for a frontcourt player at just 6-0 he nonetheless had no difficulty finishing and rebounding inside against taller opponents.
Hamilton has a solid all-around game. He might well be under consideration for Player of the Year honors in the years to come.
Our fifth and final selection is a "sleeper" candidate -- Lane Gilbert, Shakamak.
Gilbert is "my kind of player" - as is Hamilton.
Gilbert's toughness belies his seemingly scrawny build. He is long and deceptively athletic. Best rebounder I've seen for his size and a dependable scorer.
J.B. Neill usually assigned Gilbert to guard the other team's top scorer - quite a responsibility for a sophomore, but Gilbert never backed down from the challenge. He was assigned to guard Cooper Neese when Cloverdale came to town.
I'm expecting big things from Lane Gilbert these next couple years.
And we'll see a lot more of these guys next year. Jackson is the lone senior of this bunch. Meurer and Gilmore are juniors. Hamilton and Gilbert will have two seasons after this one.
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If I'm a coach, you give me these five guys and a decent big man I'll take on all comers!
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Terry Schwinghammer is a sports writer for the Greene County Daily World. He can be reached by telephone at (812) 847-4487, ext. 27. He can also be reached via email at tschwing32@yahoo.com.
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