Munster gets out-Munstered by Merrillville

MUNSTER| What a difference a year makes. What a difference a night makes.

A year after the rarest of rare in the region — Class 4A No. 1 Munster going to No. 2 Merrillville and winning in a classic — something even more strange occurred on Saturday. A team came into "The Fieldhouse" and out-Munstered Munster.

"You could say that happened," a frustrated Mustangs coach, Mike Hackett, said.

Merrillville's Zoran Talley hit a baseline runner with 8.1 seconds remaining that gave the Pirates a 54-53 win against The Times No. 5 'Stangs (13-3).

Last year fans walked through the aftermath of a blizzard for a sold-out game. Munster was half-filled in this one. Merrillville (9-7) played poorly on Friday night in Crown Point, shooting just 23 percent from the field.

The Bucs were 21-of-37 against Munster for a much-improved 57 percent.

"Coach Hackett was at Merrillville when I was playing there and he's the best coach in the area," Merrillville coach T.J. Lux said. "He's the gold standard. He's got a good thing going here so to say we borrowed a little from that is fine with me."

Munster led by five midway through the final quarter with ball in hand. That's when things started happening to them that they normally do to others.

Dropped passes out of bounds. Other turnovers. Missed free throws. Missed defensive assignments.

"I think we had one coming," Lux said.

"We came out tonight with a different attitude," said Talley, who had a game-high 20 points. "We played real bad (at Crown Point). We played with a lot of heart tonight. A lot of heart."

Jelani Pruitt scored 12 for Merrillville while B.J. Jenkins added 11. Instead of an out-of-control offensive playbook, the Pirates slowed it down, took care of the ball and hit shots when they were needed.

Nate Bubash led Munster with 19 points and his half-court shot at the buzzer drew iron before bouncing out. Danilo Zekovic chipped in 10 in the loss.