Editors Note... Anyone who has ever played in high school sports knows all too well that experience stays with you all your days. I remember and use daily things passed on to me by my coach, the legendary Illinois coach, Ed Butkovitch. A few short years after graduation all of us begin to realize all that our coaches had actually taught us beyond just sports. On Wednesday, April 1st we watched as four very talented seniors were honored with the rewards of a very fine season. Many awards were given with well deserved words of praise not only to these four great senior athletes but also to their team mates as you will see below. It is a proud time but it is also a time of realizing it is goodbye to a special time in your life. This is not only true for the players but also the coaches. Head Coach Mark Darr honored our four graduating Ducks. It wasn't with the words he spoke nor the awards he presented, but it was in his voice and his manner as it was also the sad time for him to publicly say goodbye to four very talented young men. Ian, Josh, Taylor, and Trey thank you for all the great memories, you all very clearly have the respect of your coach but also an entire community. Great plays and seasons come and go but you have given all of us so much more than that, it is your determination, dedication, abilities, heart, and bravery we all admire and respect in you. We are all very proud of each of you.
Let's get to some awards. The information below was prepared by Coach Darr for the awards presentations ceremonies. Thank you Coach for the great evening and another great season of fine Havana Ducks Basketball...
Coach Bill Blessman introduced everyone, and talked about the freshman-sophomore team. He then presented JV team members with their letters, patches, and numerals.
Special JV Awards
JV Most Improved Award Cole McDaniel
JV Mr. Hustle Dustin Wright
JV Mr. Defense Drew Flinn
JV Most Valuable Player Cole McDaniel
Head Coach Mark Darr addressed the teams and their guests and families. "First off I would like to thank the following people. It takes more than just the coaches and the players to have a successful season."
Coach Bill Blessman, who has been our assistant for five years, and Coach Wherley, who joined our staff this season, for being great assistants this year, making sure everything was always ready when needed, and helping to guide both our freshman teams and our freshman-sophomore teams this season. Some weeks, our assistants would be gone coaching 4 sometimes 5 nights per week, with freshman games on Monday, Thursday, and Saturday, and even on Wednesday some weeks, and varsity games on Tuesday, Friday, and Saturdays. It takes a lot of dedication to be an underclass coach at a small school. I thank you gentlemen.
Administration Mr. Howarth, Athletic Director, Mr. Willett, our High School Principal, and Mr. Twomey, our Superintendent.
Parents For bringing the kids to practice and being supportive of the program.
Lisa Painter, Cheerleading Sponsor
Matt McDaniel, for doing our book all season
Brandon Painter for doing the clock at home games and for doing stats on the road.
Custodians For making sure all baskets were always down and the gym was always ready to go for practices and games.
Ted Connolly For taking pictures at every home game, putting them on 62644.com and highschoolsports.net websites, and for allowing the use of some of his pictures for our Senior Plaques.
Most of all, I want to thank the players, Freshmen thru Seniors, who gave us everything they had each practice, and for giving everything they had when they stepped on the floor during games. I was extremely proud of the consistency that we showed this season.
The Varsity kids had a tremendous season this year.
We finished 24-9, winning the Beardstown Tournament for the first time ever beating Midwest Central in the Championship game by almost twenty points. We defeated Pittsfield in the first game of the Beardstown Tournament, a game quite frankly not many people outside of our team, thought we werent supposed to win. We defeated Abingdon the second time we played them in the regional semifinals, after losing to them just a week and a half earlier, avenging the conference loss. We beat Delavan this season, another team who had 20 plus wins, and a lot of the season was ranked in the Top 10 in the State 1A Rankings. We beat Midwest Central, a county rival, twice this season. Along with many other great victories such as PORTA twice, AC Central/Virginia, Camp Point Central, and several other quality programs. We competed this season in a very tough Prairieland Conference with teams such as Brimfield, Abingdon, Lewistown, each of whom ended with 20 wins or more. So along with us, that made 4 teams in our conference with 20 plus wins, the toughest the conference has been in the last five years. As far as win total, they gave us the most wins a Havana team has had since the 1993-1994 season. They have a lot to be proud of, and I want to thank them for a wonderful run.
Introduction of the Juniors and Seniors and present them with their pins and certificates.
Travis Davenport
Chris Sarff
Levi Bridges
Alex Noble
Sam Kachanuk
Trey Bergman
Ian Bridges
Taylor Walker
Josh Ivey
Special Varsity Awards
All Conference Awards Taylor Walker and Trey Bergman
Joey Long Hustle Award Josh Ivey
Field Goal Percentage Award Sam Kachanuk 58.5 % (96/164) minimum 40 attempts
Leadership Award - Levi Bridges (Given out by the coaches) Displaying leadership, playing through adversity, injury, etc. Never questioning anything asked of him on the court.
There was a tie for the Varsity Most Improved Josh Ivey and Ian Bridges
Steals Award Trey Bergman (79 steals)
Most Three-Pointers Taylor Walker (82 3s)
Charge Award Trey Bergman (5 charges)
Rebounding Award Josh Ivey (156 rebounds)
State Qualifier Three Point Shootout - Alex Noble
Assist Award - Trey Bergman (125 assists)
Free Throw Award Alex Noble (43-54 rounded to 79.6 80%)
Mr. Defense Ian Bridges (guarded other teams best player almost every game, and shut down a lot of top scorers)
Mr. Offense Trey Bergman (15.4 pts/game)
Career Three Pointers 176 Taylor Walker
Varsity MVP - Trey Bergman
