The Van-Far boys don’t care right now who scores, just that they are wearing an Indians uniform.

Van-Far vs Wright City Photo Gallery

The Indians won their fifth straight game after s 57-35 victory Monday at home against Eastern Missouri Conference foe Wright City, finishing with five players at or close to double-figures scoring. Van-Far pushed its lead to as big as 32 points and played with a running clock in the fourth quarter.

Van-Far head coach Pat Connaway said his team “sealed the game” in the first minute and a half of the second quarter after a slow start in the first eight minutes, leading 7-4. The Indians (15-10, 5-4 EMO) built a 27-8 halftime lead as they started to distribute the ball around.

“Being able to win the second quarter 20-4 basically put the thing away,” Connaway said. “The ball movement is getting better and the confidence of knocking shots down is opening things up.”

Carter Jennings led Van-Far with 15 points, seven rebounds, two 3-pointers and a block, Nikos Connaway followed with 12 points, eight rebounds and four steals, Cody Smith finished with nine points and four steals, Pacey Reading had nine points, and Gage Gibson had eight points and two 3-pointers.

In each of the Indians’ two games before Wright City (3-15, 1-7 EMO), they had four or five players in double figures in an 80-46 win at Missouri Military Academy and a 73-42 win at home against Wellsville-Middletown.

Nikos Connaway is Van-Far’s leading scorer as he is averaging 19.8 points per game. Connaway is also the leading facilitator with 3.8 assists per game, but the Indians are averaging 11 assists as a team.

“When we share the ball, we make it a lot easier for everyone,” Connaway said. “We get open looks, feed the post and then kick out. Our shots are more likely to go in.”

There were games earlier in the season where Connaway, who has more than 1,000 career points, took much of the scoring responsibility or someone else or two Indians had good nights. It was rare, however, when Van-Far could be five-deep on the floor.

Nikos Connaway said the past few games said playing all those games over the season has built something special on the team.

“I think we’re all building more confidence, and we’re building more confidence in each other,” Connaway said. “We trust each other more, and we all know we can put the ball in the hole.”

Jennings had 16 points against MMA before he was the Indians’ leading scorer on Monday night as he towered over the Wildcats.

“That’s one of our keys, when he plays and he’s as active, it opens things up,” Pat Connaway said. “We can work off him in the low series.”

Connaway recalls being five-strong on the floor in 2018, when the Indians won their most recent state title. While he cautioned they aren’t at that level as of this moment, the principle of being tough to guard with five scorers still holds true.

Wright City was able to score 13 points in the fourth quarter with a running clock as Carle’on Jones awoke in the second half for all of his nine points to lead Wright City. During most of the game, Connaway said Van-Far was solid on defense.

“We knew they were going to do a lot of ball screens so we wanted to trap the ball screen,” Connaway said. “We wanted to get there to either be able to take a charge or steal the slip. At least, we made them catch it at 15 feet and forced them to shoot some tough shots.”

After facing Class 2 District 5 Tournament No. 1 seed Clopton on the road on Thursday, Van-Far has Silex (2-17) at 6:30 p.m. Feb. 20 in the first round of districts in Sturgeon. The Indians has the No. 2 seed behind Clopton, and Connaway said they feel good about that.

“I like the 2 seed because we don’t get a bye, so we get to play that game to get used to the Sturgeon gym,” Connaway said.