‘I knew it was going to be a pretty good night.’ Madison Central stays hot, wins region.
It didn’t take long for Madison Central Coach Allen Feldhaus to realize his team was ready for its 11th Region Tournament championship game against Frederick Douglass on Saturday at Eastern Kentucky’s McBrayer Arena.
After falling behind 7-2 in the opening moments, the Indians made three consecutive three-point attempts, one by Will Hardin and two by Jaylen Davis. to tie it 11-11.
“When Jaylen hit those first couple, I knew it was going to be a pretty good night, because we’re kind of streaky,” Feldhaus said, nodding to how his team made 71 percent of its three-point attempts against Lexington Catholic in the first round Monday. “It helps when you have multiple people who can shoot it, too — when you’ve got four starters who can step out there and get hot and they’re capable of hitting five or six a night.”
On Saturday, Madison Central (21-9) made eight out of 14 three-point attempts, including two during a key 10-0 run in the third quarter that helped the Indians stretch their lead and ultimately pull away from Douglass in an 80-62 victory to earn the school’s fifth championship in the boys’ 11th Region Tournament.
“Coach has been talking to us about how efficient our offense has been, especially in practice,” said senior guard Kole Browne, who scored 21 points and grabbed 12 rebounds on his way to being named the tournament’s most valuable player. “We, all of us, are in the gym every day getting shots up. That’s why they’re falling in the game. We’ve just got to keep going and hopefully make it all the way to a state championship.”
While Madison Central didn’t match the ridiculous shot percentage of earlier in the week, it did shoot a robust 55.6 percent from the field against the Broncos, while at the same time holding Douglass to just 35.8 percent.
Typically a team that plays mostly man-to-man defense, Feldhaus employed both a 2-3 zone and a box-and-one defense, to frustrate the Broncos and their leading scorer, Dashawn Jackson.
“Everybody knows when you play Madison Central basketball, we play man-to-man. … But when you get to tournament time — when it’s do or die and you lose and go home — I’m willing to try anything,” Feldhaus said. “Truthfully, we’re a better zone team than man-to-man team, because we’ve got Trey Skaggs and Jaylen Davis and both have those long arms. They cause a lot of trouble out in the front of that zone.”
Douglass matched Madison Central nearly shot for shot in the first half as the game saw two ties and seven lead changes. But in the third quarter, the Indians quickly turned a 35-34 deficit into a 50-39 lead as Will Hardin and Jaylen Davis each hit threes and Browne broke into the lane for back-to-back layups that prompted Douglass Coach Jason Moseley to call a timeout to try to halt the momentum with 2:28 to play in the third quarter. Less than four minutes had elapsed since Douglass held the one-point lead.
Feldhaus credited Hardin, who as a 6-4 center is often outsized by his opponents, as one of the primary keys to his team’s success.
“What can you say about a five-man that we can bring out on the floor and be a point guard for us?” Feldhaus said.
Actually, Hardin calls it “point center,” and said he likes to model his game on the NBA’s Nikola Jokic.
“I like to shot fake, I like to shoot threes, and I like to pass, too,” said Hardin, who tallied 19 points, including two three-pointers, plus eight rebounds and a team-high five assists. “It feels even better to get someone else an open shot to knock it down.”
Hardin leads the team in field goal percentage and three-point field goal percentage.
“Ever since I came back from COVID, I’ve been red-hot,” Hardin said, shrugging. “Now, we’ve just got to put this behind us and go win a state championship. We’ve got to go game by game.”
When asked what the key was to how Coach Feldhaus got the team to gel this season, Davis joked “a lot of yelling. But honestly, he teaches defense. Defense brings championships is what he says. I feel like we listened to him to get the job done.”
Davis finished with 21 points and made four of five three-pointers and seven of his eight free throws. Kai Simpson led Douglass with 18 points. Jackson and Julius Scearce added 14 and 12 points, respectively. The Broncos (19-2) won their second 42nd District title and made their first 11th Region finals in the school’s four years of existence.
There were times this season when Feldhaus had to play games with just six varsity players. His team had COVID-19 stoppages. He also sat out briefly after suffering a broken leg in a slip on the ice. And Davis missed some time after the loss of his father.
“But finally, I could see it. I mean, we thought we had a pretty good basketball team if we ever got them all back and got them in shape,” Feldhaus said. “I could kind of see that district tournament week, things were starting to gel and we were playing the way I felt we were capable of playing.
“They finally bought in and realized how we needed to play in order to win. I think there were times last year, and even at the beginning of this year that we had some people who thought they had to carry the team instead of letting everybody join in. We just kept harping on it and harping on it and those last couple of weeks, everybody’s bought in.”
Madison Central will face Ballard, the 7th Region champion, at 5 p.m. Wednesday in the KHSAA Boys’ Sweet 16 basketball tournament at Rupp Arena. The last time those two teams played in that venue, Madison Central beat Ballard for the state championship in 2013.
All-Tournament Team
Kole Browne (MVP), Jaylen Davis, Will Harin, and Braeden Ray, Madison Central; Dashawn Jackson, Julius Scearce, and Kai Simpson, Douglass; Zac Cox and Fred Farrier, Franklin County; Tim Hall Jr. and Nick Spalding, Paul Laurence Dunbar; Trent DeVries, Madison Southern; Aziel Blackwell, Henry Clay; Ben Johnson, Lexington Catholic; Jackson Twombly, Frankfort.
Highlights
This story was originally published March 28, 2021 at 9:19 AM.
