Indiana Future Stars Game - Benter Seals It for the South

Jack Benter exits the tunnel at Gainbridge Fieldhouse after sealing off his Indiana-All Stars week with one final win as the Indiana Future Stars team from the South beat the North team, 100-96.

His week with the Indiana All-Stars Junior team went about as well as it could have, if you ignore how it started that is.

"Went good after Sunday," Benter tells me after the game about his week. "Thought I played much better the rest of the week."

For the shooter from Brownstown Central, his first game in Jeffersonville against the Kentucky Juniors couldn't have been more uncharacteristic. Benter will go into next season with an argument for best scorer in the state of Indiana, but down in the deepest South of Indiana, he couldn't make anything. 0-8 from three couldn't make anything.

Benter looked uncomfortable on the court. For someone that thrives in a system and with the ball in his hands, Benter struggled in that first game with teammates who he practiced with for the first time about an hour before tip-off.

That Jeffersonville game was on Sunday. On Wednesday, the Indiana All-Stars would take a break from the games with the state of Kentucky and turn towards each other. At Cathedral High School, the Indiana All-Stars would take on the Indiana Future All-Stars.

For Benter, the game started much the same way, with his shot not falling. He missed all 5 of his threes in the first half, but the Benter on the court didn't look like the one in Jeffersonville. Even without his shot falling, he was active on the glass, and found ways to get to the free throw line.

Then the first three fell in the second half, and then another from almost the exact same spot a spot behind the three-point line on the right break.

Benter would go on to score 24 points in the game, 20 of those coming in the second half as the Juniors pulled off the upset of the Seniors, 105-100.

The 2024 Purdue commit out of the small 2A Brownstown Central High School was finding his groove with the Junior All-Stars and as they usually do with him, the points followed.

That carried over to the biggest stage, when the Indiana Future's Game featured the best of the Juniors in Indiana from the South taking on the best of the Juniors in Indiana from the North at Gainbridge Fieldshouse.

Kokomo big man and 5-star Rivals prospect, Flory Bidunga, would take home MVP honors after scoring 21 points and grabbing 13 rebounds, including a big block on Benter at the rim late in the game, but it was Benter that hit a three late to give South a one-point lead before closing out he game with two free throws that extended the South's lead to 3 with less than a minute to play.

Benter might have been thinking about the Bidunga block when he responded to my question about Bidunga getting the MVP award and the loss.

"He's really good so I can't really complain," he said with a laugh.

Again, it was Benter's all-around game that shined while in an All-Star game setting. Benter had 14 points to go along with 7 rebounds, 3 assists, and 2 steals.

Benter's week featured going up against some of the best players in the state and Kentucky. It went exactly as he hoped.

"It's great for me," he told me after the game. "To get better as a player."

Benter's summer doesn't slow down much from here. He'll be at Purdue next week with Brownstown Central for a shootout and then back onto the AAU circuit in July.