Five things we learned this week in high school boys basketball:

Ben Davis a different team, still a dangerous team

With Lawrence North, Fishers, Westfield and others at the top of the Class 4A poll for most of the season, defending state champion Ben Davis is flying a little under the radar.

There are good reasons. The Giants lost two Indiana All-Stars in Zane Doughty (Ball State) and Sheridan Sharp (Southern Illinois) and key starters like Clay Butler and Shaun Arnold to graduation. Interim coach Corey Taylor, a former assistant, moved into a new role when coach Don Carlisle was placed on leave in September (Carlisle has been cleared to return as coach for next season).

It is just … different.

“I think the biggest difference from last year is Zane not being here,” said senior K.J. Windham, referring to the 6-9 Doughty. “Last year we relied on him a lot. We could miss a lot of shots or get to the rim and not finish, and Zane would be there to finish. It’s just adjusting to a new team, too. We lost seven players, lost some size, but we’re still as fast if not faster than last year. We’ve had a lot of ups and downs, still adjusting to a new coach — not a new coach, but a new head coach — and new style of play from last year. But the main thing is we’re playing our best basketball at tournament time.”

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Ben Davis played one of its best games, or certainly one of its best quarters, Saturday afternoon in a 62-49 win over Zionsville. The Giants trailed 22-18 at halftime before putting together a dominating 22-9 third quarter as Windham, the Northwestern recruit, hit three 3-pointers and scored 13 of his game-high 19 points. Junior Mark Zackery, who has moved into a new role as point guard, scored eight of his 14 points in the third.

The Giants are 13-4 going into games this week at Covenant Christian (Tuesday), at Lawrence North (Friday) and vs. Lawrence Central (Saturday). Wins in the two weekend games would clinch at least a share of the MIC title with potential to still win it outright. Lawrence North (3-0), Lawrence Central (3-1) and Ben Davis (2-1) all have a chance to win the six-team MIC. Lawrence North’s final MIC game is Feb. 16 vs. Pike.

It would be wise not to dismiss Ben Davis as a serious contender in the tournament. With Windham, Zackery and senior Mark White, the Giants have three players who were heavily involved in last year’s tournament run. Others, including senior Ramone Enis and 6-7 junior Tavion Williams, are playing key roles. Williams had 13 points in the win over Zionsville.

“I think, confidently, that we are still the best team in the state,” Windham said. “When we need to play basketball, we play basketball. I think we have times where we get comfortable, and we just had that talk (Friday). We had a two-hour film session where we talked with the coaches in there about taking responsibility. We have kids who won state who want to do it again. Everyone wants to win, and it feels like we’re starting to come together. All the little stuff, we’re working on together. We’ve all had to take on new roles.”

Ben Davis will probably go into Class 4A Sectional 11 as the favorite, though the Giants did lose to Franklin Central in the quarterfinals of the Marion County tournament and could see the Flashes (9-10) again. Others in Sectional 11, which will played at Southport, are Roncalli (10-7), Decatur Central (9-7), Southport (6-10), Pike (5-12) and Perry Meridian (4-15).

None of those teams have the combination of talent and experience of the Giants. Ben Davis showed it on Saturday, especially in the third quarter.

“Third quarter was kind of our quarter last year,” Windham said. “We’ve kind of struggled with them this year. Now we need to put together a full game. We really haven’t done it yet. Once we do that, we’re definitely going to put everybody back on notice. I think we’re easily the No. 1 team in the state, regardless of the losses.”

Fishers takes down No. 1 team in Illinois

Chalk one up for Indiana over Illinois.

Class 4A second-ranked Fishers made the trek to O’Fallon, Ill., for the Bank of O’Fallon Shootout and demolished the No. 1 team in Illinois, Homewood-Flossmoor, 78-57. Senior Keenan Garner was named game MVP with 20 points, 11 rebounds, five assists and two steals as the Tigers (18-1) dropped Homewood-Flossmoor to 24-3.

Fishers led the whole way, jumping out to a 40-28 lead at halftime and pulling away in the fourth quarter. Freshman Cooper Zachary added 14 points and senior Taden Metzger had 12. Homewood-Flossmoor’s team includes senior guard and Columbia commit Gianni Cobb (13 points), 6-3 senior Carson Brownfield (20 points) and 6-6 junior guard Bryce Heard (19 points), a four-star prospect with offers from Illinois, Oklahoma, USC and several others.

That caps a strong week for Fishers, which came back from last week’s loss to Carmel to defeat Hoosier Crossroads Conference rival Westfield 51-49 on Thursday night. There is no letup in the schedule, though, as the Tigers host Cathedral on Friday night.

Carmel knocks off another undefeated No. 1 team

It was a good week for Sectional 8 teams, including and especially Carmel, which ran its winning streak to five games with a 42-35 win over previously undefeated and No. 1 Lawrence North. How would you rank the teams in Sectional 8?

The Associated Press poll for 4A had it this way going into last week: No. 2 Westfield, No. 3 Fishers and No. 4 Noblesville. With Fishers’ win over Westfield, that will likely change. But there are no weak links here with Hamilton Southeastern (13-6), Carmel (9-9) and Zionsville (10-9) rounding out the six-team sectional.

“It’s going to be a tough sectional,” Carmel coach Ryan Osborn said. “Every game is going to be super competitive. Somebody asked me, ‘Who are the bottom teams?’ There really aren’t any. There’s not a bottom two or bottom one. I think Fishers is probably ahead and Westfield is playing well but when the sectional comes, none of that stuff is going to matter.”

The last regular-season games between Sectional 8 opponents are Carmel at Hamilton Southeastern on Friday and Fishers at Zionsville on Feb. 16.

Five scores that popped this week

∎ Anderson 50, Richmond 45: The Indians are now 15-4 after beating Richmond and Marion. Anderson plays at Kokomo on Feb. 16 with the North Central Conference title likely on the line. Richmond dropped to 18-2.

∎ Kokomo 91, Cathedral 74: The Wildkats (17-3) seem to be putting it together with an eighth consecutive win since losing to Crispus Attucks at the Hall of Fame Classic. Flory Bidunga and Karson Rogers combined for 46 points, 29 rebounds and 11 assists.

∎ Noblesville 57, Mt. Vernon 26: The Millers (16-2) have won four in a row, including dominating games against Franklin Central (61-31), Guerin Catholic (71-41) and Mt. Vernon. Those are the worst losses this season for all three of those teams.

∎ Orleans 35, Loogootee 32: Class A third-ranked Orleans (14-2) earned a big win over a rival it will likely see again in Sectional 63. Second-ranked Barr-Reeve (14-2) is also in that field and knocked off Orleans in three overtimes earlier this season.

∎ Wapahani 112, Union (Modoc) 18: Yikes. Union’s only two wins this year are against non-IHSAA schools. Wapahani (16-2) is one of the best teams in Class 2A.

Final thoughts and observations

I don’t pretend to have all the answers but if you have made it this far, some random, quick-hitting thoughts and observations to leave you with:

∎ There are a lot of things I love about high school basketball. The total lack of monitor reviews is rising up the list every year. College basketball is a train wreck of unnecessarily long reviews and delays. It took 22 minutes to play the last 34.4 seconds of the Butler-Creighton game and there was an 8-minute delay in the Kentucky-Tennessee game. It is staggering in the difference watching the high school game pace — or even the NBA — compared to college.

∎ I love the Cascade gym. It opened in 1964 when Cascade opened as a consolidation of Amo, Clayton and Stilesville. The gym sits in the middle of the school with a sunken-bowl feel of gyms like New Castle, Edinburgh, Orleans, Indian Creek and others. Cool place and sort of a hidden gem in Hendricks County.

∎ Zionsville juniors Maguire Mitchell and Drew Snively are tough to stop. The 6-6 Mitchell went for 20 points and the 6-4 Snively had 19 in Zionsville’s 62-49 loss to Ben Davis on Saturday afternoon. Mitchell looks much improved from his sophomore year; he came into Saturday’s game averaging 22.1 points with Snively at 17.9.

∎ I should have listed Donovan Hamilton somewhere in the breakdown of Indiana All-Stars. Hamilton is a Purdue football recruit but leads HSE (13-6) in scoring (14.0 ppg), rebounds (7.1) and assists (2.4). Hamilton is deserving of mention.

∎ KC Berry of Decatur Central eclipsed the 1,000-point mark for his career in the Hawks’ 50-45 loss to Terre Haute North on Saturday afternoon. Berry joins Kenny Tracy (1,376 points), Devon Dumes (1,306) and Bobby Anglea (1,103) as Decatur Central boys’ players to reach 1,000 points. Anthony Ball, who played his senior season at Decatur Central after Southport and Beech Grove, had 1,001 career points.

∎ There is one undefeated team remaining: Greenfield-Central (18-0). The Cougars host Franklin County (7-11) on Friday and at Avon (11-8) on Saturday.

*Maybe it’s the world we live in where everything is on video, but it seems like there are more ugly incidents happening at games and in the bleachers. The latest happened in the fourth quarter of Muncie Central’s 70-53 win over visiting Marion on Thursday. There were no punches thrown but the game was delayed in the fourth quarter after a Marion player shoved a Muncie Central from behind. The game was completed without incident after the delay but stuff like that can ignite quickly.

Call Star reporter Kyle Neddenriep at (317) 444-6649.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Indiana high school boys basketball: What we learned this week