AKRON – The Tippecanoe Valley boys basketball team, on paper, has earned the right to be called 
a sectional favorite.

However, Valley coach Bill Patrick really doesn’t want to hear any of that talk as
 the postseason nears.

“I don’t think we are the favorite,” said the old-school Patrick in his typical fashion. “I think there 
are three pretty even teams in our sectional when it comes to talent. In fact, I think there are 
probably four of the six who could win the sectional.

“It’s all about who’s playing well that week.”

The Vikings will look for their first sectional trophy since 2007 in the Class 3A Wawasee
 Sectional.

For the record, Patrick includes his squad among the favorites, along with defending champion 
NorthWood and West Noble. 
The Vikings own an impressive 16-3 mark that includes a 7-0 run in the Three Rivers Conference for the first time since the 2007-08 season.

Valley, whose losses were at Warsaw (72-64) in the season opener, at
 Plymouth (63-46) on Jan. 5 and last Friday at Triton (65-59), beat possible sectional foes Fairfield 57-40 and NorthWood 59-53 in their own holiday tourney in
 late December. The win over Fairfield on Dec. 21 gave Patrick his 700th career win, making him one of just five boys coaches in
 state history to reach the milestone total.

But all that is relative now that Valley knows its first-round opponent – the Wawasee Warriors. The Vikings will have a test run Friday night at home when it hosts the Warriors (5-14), then the two teams meet back at Wawasee Tuesday night with the season on the line.

“We’ve gotten better this season,” said Patrick. “I think both of the losses to Warsaw and to Plymouth were wake-up
calls for our kids. We learned something in both of those games.

“I think we’re playing okay right now, but I’m not really sure. Playing Bremen and Triton in two of our last three 
games will be a good tuneup for the sectional. Those are two really good teams and those games will tell us 
where we are at.

“We just need to keep working on the little things and fundamentals in preparation for the sectional. Our defense at times has 
been really pretty good and that’s been a big thing for us. We need to become a better rebounding team and 
we need to have some other players step up in terms of scoring for us. We need to get better ball movement 
offensively and get some other players involved in the scoring.”

Valley, which was allowing just 46.3 points-per-game through its first 17 games, 
has been led all year by its prolific 1-2 scoring punch of senior Nick Kindig and junior Tanner Andrews. Each 
are averaging about 18 points-per-game on the season. Kindig, a fine shooting guard, went over 1,000 career 
points earlier this season. Andrews, an athletic 6-3 forward, tied the school’s single-game scoring record with 
51 points (set by Trey Eaton) in a record-shattering 146-56 TRC home win over Wabash on Feb. 1.

“Both Nick and Tanner have had good years for us,” said Patrick, now in his 15th season at Valley and 44th overall. “Tanner is probably
 scoring more than we anticipated.
”

“The thing is that we need to have three of four other players scoring 8-10 points per game for us. We have several kids
 who are capable of scoring, like Chainey Zolman and Alex Thacker.”

Valley, which lost 40-35 to then host NorthWood in a first-round sectional game a year ago, also counts on 5-11 sophomore 
Thacker, 6-5 sophomore Zolman, 6-1 junior Ben Shriver and 5-10 senior Jacob Ritchey. 
The Vikings did have former starters Robby Groom and Logan Britton, both juniors, decide to quit the team on Jan. 26.

NorthWood have struggled late in the season as the Panthers had dropped five in a row prior to their final three regular season games. West
 Noble received a tough blow late in the season when they lost top scorer Drew Schermerhorn, who was averaging 14 points-per-game, to a season-ending
 ankle injury.

“The sectional is something that our kids really want, especially our two seniors in Kindig and Ritchey,” Patrick said.
 “I think we can be competitive in the tourney. We have a tough sectional and then it would be a tough regional too if we could
 advance.

“But, I do think we can compete with anyone.”