Do We Have A Record-Holder Amoung US

After writing the column a month ago about Matt McCarty scoring his 57 points against Frankfort in 1994, I ran into the scoring machine at the recent basketball game between Southmont and North Montgomery.

We started talking about basketball back in the day and some of the games that I remembered watching him play in the old Crawfordsville gym. There were a few other games I remembered in particular, like the double overtime sectional championship loss and this shooting exhibition his junior season.

That game was played on Jan. 23, 1993 against Central Catholic. This was the final year games were played in the old gym and McCarty put on a display that many people will never forget.

All he did that night was set a gym record with 42 points in a 97-83 Athenians victory. He broke the Crawfordsville scoring record in the the gym by surpassing the 39-point mark set by Dick Wilkinson during the 1960-61 season.

While scoring 42 points is a great effort in its own right, it was how he scored the 42 points that makes me remember that night like it was last week.

McCarty ripped the nets by sinking 10 3-pointers. Not only did he hit 10 3s, but he was a perfect 10-for-10 from from behind the arc. Yep, 10-for-10. He did not miss a shot from long range. He ended the game 13-of-16 for the field, which means he was only 3-of-6 on 2-point field goals. He was 6-of-9 from the free throw line.

As a team, the Athenians hit 13-of-20 3-pointers for the game. While that was impressive, so was Central Catholic’s 40 attempts from 3-point range for the game. The Knights went 11-of-40 from long. Nearly two-thirds of the Knights’ shots for the night came from behind the arc as they put up 68 shots overall.

Ironically, the Athenians hit a better percent from 3-point range that night (65 percent) than it did from the foul line (60 percent).

The night before, McCarty scored just 11 points and hit only 2-of-7 3-pointers. The game following the 10-for-10 effort, McCarty scored 10 points and was 0-for-5 from 3-point range.

He must have liked playing against the Knights because the next year he scored 32 points and hit 13-of-21 from the floor, but only 1-of-5 from 3-point range.

I recently went onto Hickoryhusker.com which is like the Bible for high school basketball fans. There is a record section and I decided to check out what the record for most 3-pointers without a miss for one game was. I knew Matt’s effort had to be close. The record listed is 9-for-9 by Delta’s Tanner Lambert set during the 2015-16 season. The person currently listed in second place is North Montgomery’s DJ Byrd against Greencastle in the 2005-06 season.

I have printed out the newspaper article from the Journal Review and will send that to Leigh Evans who runs the site in an attempt to get Matt’s effort recognized. If it is, he will be the state record-holder. It will also mean Montgomery County will hold two of the top three spots in this category.

The 10 3s in a game isn’t good enough to get him on the list for most 3-pointers in a game, though, as that mark is 14 and to make the Top 10 list a player had to have made 11 in a game.

If he makes the list we will be sure to let you know.