Eller's hot hand leads Cougars over Vikings
By Greg Hoffman

Delphi's Matt Lewis is fouled going to the bucket by a Tipton player Friday night. Tipton won the game 44-35. Bill Stauffer photo

Carroll evened its record (1-1) of the young season with a 64-49 win at North White on Saturday.

This one was a lot closer than the final score indicated. The Vikings gave the Cougars all they wanted for three full quarters. North White jumped out to a 4-0 lead. Carroll came back and knotted the score at 4. For the rest of the quarter the two teams saw three lead changes and two ties before the quarter ended at 14 all.

In the second stanza, the two teams again went back and forth at each other with 10 lead changes and a tie before the Cougars took a 2-point lead at half-time, 32-30. This was the team's biggest lead of the quarter. North White's biggest lead of 5 points came midway in the second period. Riley Eller scored 12 of his first half 16 points in the second quarter. He was also 3 of 3 from behind the arc. Adam Tussinger helped out with 10 points.

Baskets by Tussinger and Jason Hazel gave the Cougars a 36-30 advantage before North White came storming back with an 11 to 4 run to go up 41-40 after three.

The fourth quarter belonged to the Cougars. They outscored the Vikings 15-0 to go up 55-41. The run was started by Eller with 5 straight free throws and a trey. Tussinger had a pair of baskets and Kevin Ives, a three-point play.

Eller led Carroll with a game and career high 28 points. Tussinger added a career high 20 points and handed out 5 assists. Carroll lost the rebound battle 23-20 with Carson Spesard (off the bench) and Tussinger grabbing 7 boards each. Tussinger also handed out 5 assists and Eller 4. They both had 3 steals each.

Carroll was 22 of 46 (.478) from the field, 5 of 9 (.566) from behind the arch, and was an

excellent 15 of 17 (.882) from the free throw line. North White was 18 of 44 (.409) from the field and 10 of 14 (.714) from the line.

Next up for the Cougars are night road trips to Caston on Friday and to Lewis Cass on Saturday. Carroll leads the series against Caston 21-15, but trails Cass 32-16 in that series.

Carroll JV

Carroll led at all stops on their way to their second win, defeating North White there Saturday 61-44 to improve their record to 2-0.

The Cougars were up 7-5 after one and after 2 ties and 2 lead changes in the second quarter, took the lead for good on an Adam Spesard fielder at 14-12 with 3:30 left in the period. The Cougars led 23-19 at the half and increased their led to ten at 44-34 after three.

Three players were in double figures for the Cougars - Kyle Geheb led the way with 13, while Primmer Zook added 12, Brad Benson 10 and Drew Yoder and Spesard had 9 each.