50 After 50: No. 20 Raiders avenge two losses each to Warsaw, Pittsfield on way to best finish in school history

The Illinois High School Association created a second class for boys basketball for the 1971-72 school year. The 2020-21 season would have been the 50th year of the boys basketball small-school tournament. Muddy River Sports is celebrating 50 years of small-school boys basketball by ranking the 50 best teams in Adams, Brown, Pike and Hancock counties since 1972.

No. 20 — 1998-99 Quincy Notre Dame

QUINCY — Brian McNeil’s basketball career certainly had its share of highlights. 

He averaged 19 points and 11 rebounds as a senior. The Herald-Whig named him the Player of the Year, and the Associated Press selected him to the Class A all-state team. The 6-foot-9 center led Quincy Notre Dame to a 28-6 record third-place finish in the 1999 Class A state tournament.

McNeil played four years at Quincy University, and when he graduated in 2003, he left as the fourth all-time leading scorer in school history with 1,501 points.

However, basketball didn’t always come easily for McNeil.

“When I was little, I was pretty clumsy,” he said. “I wasn’t even a part of the ACES (the grade school developmental program for future Quincy Notre Dame players) much at all. I always came off the bench and never really started until my sophomore year. That’s when I really started like I was figuring it out a little bit.”

The Raiders returned three key players — McNeil, senior guard Jason Volm and junior forward Casey Tushaus — from a 24-6 team in 1997-98 that won more games than any QND team had in the last 16 years. However, it took Quincy Notre Dame a little while to figure it out during the 1998-99 season as well.

“We really kind of knew that we had something going, and we could definitely make a run,” McNeil said. “I don’t think we really had the expectations to get to state or whatever, but all of us knew we had good core people. We were a close-knit team.”

The Raiders opened the season with a five-team round-robin tournament at home during Thanksgiving week, and they split four games. The two losses were 74-70 to Warsaw and 65-62 to Pittsfield — teams the Raiders had to learn how to beat.

The Warsaw game was especially thrilling. McNeil had a season-high 39 points and 15 rebounds. Warsaw’s Jason Edwin, who had sat out his sophomore season after coming to the United States from the island of Tortola in the British Virgin Islands, matched him. Edwin had 23 points, 11 rebounds and six blocked shots.

“Coach (Scott) Douglas and Coach (Bob) Sheffield kind of knew about (Edwin) a little, but we didn’t have any clue what kind of player he was,” McNeil said. “He was one of those players you don’t normally see at our level.”

The Raiders won eight in a row before meeting Warsaw for a second time in the semifinals of the Macomb Tournament. This time, the Wildcats handed QND its worst loss in three years in a 68-40 decision. Then on Jan. 12, 1999, the Raiders lost for a second time to Pittsfield, a 62-43 decision at Voshall Gym.

The Raiders closed the regular season by winning nine of their final 10 games, with the only loss a 52-49 setback to Normal University High. Volm (13.4 ppg) and Tushaus (12.5 ppg) helped combine with McNeil for a pretty potent threesome. QND was ranked No. 13 in the final Class A regular season state poll.

Knowing Warsaw and Pittsfield were in the Raiders’ path to the state tournament didn’t bother McNeil.

“We had confidence,” he said. “I don’t even know how I remember this, but we always said it’s hard to beat someone three times, right? Obviously, we got beat by those two teams twice, but that the third time was going to be tough. Plus we had all season to figure it out. At the end of the regular season, we were kind of running pretty solid.”

Before facing Warsaw and Pittsfield for a third time, Notre Dame had to survive three difficult postseason tests. West Pike nearly overcame a 14-point deficit in the fourth quarter before losing 78-74 in the regional semifinals at Blue Devil Gym. 

McNeil went to the bench in foul trouble with six minutes left in the third quarter of the regional championship game and the Raiders trailing by eight points. However, Tushaus scored 17 points in the second half to lead QND to a 56-50 victory over Liberty.

The Raiders were in deep trouble in the sectional semifinals at Lewistown. Three starters fouled out in the fourth quarter, and QND trailed 57-55 in the final seconds. Lewistown surrounded McNeil on the right block, so he threw a pass to Kyle Venvertloh. He pump faked and then made only the second 3-pointer of his career with four seconds left.

“I’ll never forget (that shot),” McNeil said. “It was a fadeaway 3-pointer off balance. He hadn’t hit a shot like that or a 3-pointer hardly at all. I remember the next day he tried to replicate it in practice, and he couldn’t even hit one.”

McNeil made a free throw with two seconds left to put the Raiders ahead 59-57, but Marty McGee fouled Brock Till at half-court with one second left. Till made two free throws to force overtime. QND trailed 65-62 in overtime, but Mark Kamphaus’ running hook shot tied the game with a minute to play.

Lewistown missed two shots to take the lead, and the Indians fouled McNeil on while grabbing a rebound with four seconds to play. He made one of two free throws to give QND a 67-66 victory.

“That was one where you write in the newspaper, ‘You had to see it to believe it, and you’re not going to believe what I write,’” Douglas told The Herald-Whig. “That was one of the craziest games I’ve seen, period.”

When the Raiders faced Warsaw for the third time in the sectional final, the Wildcats were without Edwin. The Illinois High School Association had revoked his status as an emancipated student before the start of the postseason and declared him ineligible to play.

Notre Dame dominated the game from the start, leading by 20 points late in the second quarter on its way to a 75-59 victory that ended Warsaw’s unbeaten season. Volm and Tushaus combined for 48 points in the game.

The Raiders then avenged the two regular-season losses to Pittsfield by winning 55-51 in the super-sectional at Western Hall in Macomb. Tushaus scored a career-high 26 points, including the go-ahead basket with 5.1 seconds to play.

“That was probably one of the most nervous games I’ve ever been in,” McNeil said. “(Tushaus) came through, especially in the postseason. Teams started double-teaming me a lot more, and Tushaus stepped up a lot.”

QND nearly squandered a 15-point fourth-quarter lead but knocked off Riverton 59-56 in the quarterfinals. However, the hopes for a state championship ended the next day when Waterloo Gibault whipped the Raiders 65-37 in the semifinals behind a 30-point, 16-rebound performance from John Thomas.

“We didn’t match up well with (Gibault) at all,” McNeil said. “They had two guys who were inside who were pretty tough. They were just a very well put-together team. We just didn’t really have much of an answer for (Thomas).”

The Raiders captured third place with a 69-65 victory over Plano. Tushaus (24), McNeil (20) and Volm (19) combined for 63 of the 69 points. They finished with a 28-6 record and the best finish at the state tournament in school history.

“It was everything we could ask for,” McNeil said.

McNeil lives in Auburn, Ill., and is an assistant varsity basketball coach at Auburn High School. His full-time job is with Residential Home Health, a home health physical therapy company. He has two children from a previous marriage, and his current wife, Brittany, has three children from a previous marriage.