Hammond Central senior Jordan Woods isn’t ready for his basketball career to be over.
But the outstanding 6-foot-3 guard is an Eastern Illinois recruit in football and has decided he won’t play basketball in college.
“That was my thought, playing both,” Woods said. “But football has been my first love. I had to make a business decision. … Football is my go-to.”
Woods also is the Wolves’ go-to on the basketball court, as he showed again in the Class 4A Munster Sectional championship game against the host Mustangs on Monday night.
Woods drove to the basket, was fouled and made the decisive free throw with 2.9 seconds left as Hammond Central edged Munster 54-53.
“I was trying to dunk it,” he said. “My mindset was putting the ball in the rim.”
Woods missed the first free throw before converting the second.
“Just make it,” he said. “Block out the noise. There was a lot of noise. But block it out. That’s all I had to do. Reset my mind (after the miss). Mistakes are going to happen. You can’t make every shot. Just reset, walk off, get calm.”
There was no doubt Woods would be called upon with the game on the line.
“I had to put the ball in his hands,” Hammond Central coach Larry Moore Jr. said. “I knew he was going to make a play. If they would’ve doubled, we had shooters. He’s been with me four years. We have to put the ball in his hands.”
Woods finished with 16 points, six rebounds and three assists for the Wolves (25-1), who will play Mishawaka (20-6) in the Michigan City Regional on Saturday.
“That’s my brother,” Hammond Central senior guard Kenneth Grant said. “He played amazing. We won this game together. He did his part. We did our part. We succeeded and won this game.”
The game featured two of the best teams in the state, with Hammond Central (25-1) ranked No. 3 in both the coaches poll and the 4A poll by The Associated Press, and Munster (24-3) at No. 15 and No. 7, respectively. The marquee matchup, which included U.S. Rep. Frank Mrvan among the attendees, lived up to the billing.
The Wolves rallied after the Mustangs scored the game’s first nine points within two minutes and after trailing by as much as 26-12 midway through the second quarter.
“We just came out slow,” Woods said. “We come out slow, they hit shots. But we came back as a team. No arguing. Just make it up.”
Junior guard Matt King, who matched Woods with 16 points, gave Hammond Central its first lead with a jumper with 3:43 left in the game. Grant added 14 points and also contributed to the defensive effort against Munster junior point guard David Cundiff.
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“In my mind, I knew my teammates needed me,” Grant said. “The whole Hammond needed me. I did it for Hammond. I didn’t do it for myself. … I did it for my whole town, my whole city.”
The Wolves overcame another big performance by Munster senior standout Brandon Trilli, who had 30 points and 13 rebounds.
After Woods made the go-ahead free throw and Munster called a timeout, Trilli snagged a baseball pass fired by junior forward Jermaine Coney, and Trilli’s good look from along the right baseline caromed off the rim as time expired.
“It was an absolutely perfect throw and execution,” Munster coach Mike Hackett said. “We’ve worked on it every year in practice, and you usually never get to use it. With 2.9 seconds to go in a sectional championship game, you get a chance to use it, and you’re like, ‘Well …’ We executed it perfect. Our best player has the ball about 8 feet away. It just wasn’t meant to be.”
Hackett tried to process what happened.
“That was two teams really, really just fighting it out, two teams that didn’t want their season to end,” he said. “And it came down to the final shot. I can’t ask for anything more from these guys. They did anything and everything asked of them all year long.
“I’m extremely, extremely proud of this group. This is the part about coaching that sucks. I really, really enjoyed practicing with this group. I enjoy hanging around the locker room with this group. I enjoy our bus rides with this group. It’s just a really, really fun group, coachable group, to be around. And now it’s over.”
Moore, whose team’s only loss this season came to Chicago Whitney Young on Dec. 27, was similarly drained.
“This team has won different ways all year,” he said. “They’re older from last year. Any time you beat a team on their home floor for sectionals, it’s huge.”
Last season, Munster beat Hammond Central, then in its first year as a school, 65-45 in a sectional semifinal. The teams returned largely intact this season.
But Woods said the Wolves didn’t necessarily draw motivation from that result.
“It was never about them,” Woods said. “It’s always about us. It’s never about the opponent. It’s about how we play. No one can speed us up or slow us down. It’s all about us.”
Although Hammond Central won its first sectional title, Hammond won three in its last four seasons of existence.
“We knew what the business was,” Grant said. “We prepared ourselves for this situation, for this moment.”