North Vermillion Stuns Monroe Central 63-55, Reaches Class 1A Semistate Final

Teagan Leonard was the story everyone in Lafayette Jefferson's gym was talking about on March 21, but the 35-point eruption from North Vermillion's rising sophomore was only part of what got the Falcons to the Class 1A semistate final. The bigger story started months earlier, 41 miles away.

North Vermillion defeated Monroe Central 63-55 at Lafayette Jefferson to advance to the program's first IHSAA Class 1A semistate finals appearance, capping a postseason run that began the previous Saturday when the Falcons beat Rossville to capture their first IHSAA regional title since 1969.

Leonard, wearing No. 12, carried North Vermillion offensively against Monroe Central, scoring 35 of the team's 63 points. No other individual scoring totals from that game were available, but the margin of his contribution was staggering for a player who won't be a junior until next fall.

The Falcons' run owed something to more than Leonard's scoring. Senior Andre Buchhaas, who struggled to log significant minutes during his first three seasons, had reinvented himself as a reliable presence in the paint. The transformation was deliberate. Buchhaas lacked the footwork, a stable pivot foot under pressure, and the back-to-the-basket moves that separated serviceable big men from effective ones. He fixed that.

"It was hard work always in the mornings in the spring and summer," Buchhaas said. "I came a long way from not getting many minutes to starting this year."

Credit for that development extended to Lafayette-based trainer Elisha Chimbanda, a 2013 Lafayette Jefferson graduate who played at Vincennes University and now serves as head coach of September's Very Own, an AAU program based in Lafayette. Chimbanda first connected with the program through senior starter Lane Thomann.

"(Thomann's) mom started asking if I did group training and told us she had a group for us," Chimbanda said. "We all got together and then had a group of kids, a group of boys and a group of girls."

That group grew to include Buchhaas, junior Graham Young, and Leonard, with players making the 41-mile drive from North Vermillion's corner of the state near the Illinois border, close to Danville, into Tippecanoe County for sessions. The arrangement reflected a broader trend of Falcons players using Lafayette-area resources to develop their games.

The Falcons fell to Triton 53-47 in the semistate final, ending what was the longest playoff run in program history. Buchhaas closed his career with 19 points and 11 rebounds in that game. Head coach Phil Buchhaas, Andre's father and a first-year head coach at North Vermillion after previous stints at South Vermillion, Fountain Central, and South Central (Union Mills), watched his son finish his playing days on that floor.

The run is over for the seniors, but Leonard and the younger Falcons are already planning their next move. Leonard is expected to return to Lafayette to train with Chimbanda and others this spring and summer, building toward a program that now knows exactly what a deep postseason run feels like.