Chris Tilton Sports: 2015-02-15

Saturday, February 21, 2015

It is an old expression, but when rivals meet you can throw out the record books. Rivals North and South ended the regular season in exciting fashion this past Friday night. It looked for a while as though it was going to be a lopsided game. But the game grew heated in the 4^th quarter when there was an 11^th hour surge that fell just short at the conclusion of the contest.

In the first quarter, it appeared that North’s Ryan Adams and South’s Wes Cole were going to put on a shooting clinic. Each scored 11 points apiece in the first quarter for their teams. McAdams last shot of the quarter was a deep 3 point shot that hit the back of the rim – but it took an advantageous bounce straight up and swished through the net on way back down. But South held the advantage at the end of the first period.

Both teams adjusted their defenses to put pressure on the other team’s shooters. Anthony Augspurger and later Winston Crozier drew the task of defending McAdams in South’s man to man defense. North adjusted their zone to take away Cole’s outside shooting. This slowed down the pace of scoring. And South had a decisive advantage at halftime, up 36-22.

Coming out of the break, North experimented with a man to man defense and also their offense seemed to focus on feeding the ball to the post. But South came out and had a nice run – growing their lead to 18 points as the teams entered the last quarter.

South was complacent in most of the 4^th quarter. The team seemed to dial back the intensity, but North seemed determined as ever. They began to claw away at the lead one possession at a time. When they closed to 12 at the 4:44 mark, coach Augspurger took a timeout to re-focus his players. But to no avail - in another minute it was an 8 point game. Now South was starting to sweat as the North crowd began to wake up and get into the game.

At a minute and a half, it was 63-56 and North had the momentum. North went to the press as they tried hard to make up the difference in the little time left. But South awakened from their slumber and scored on their next three possessions. They were fouled on two made layups and made those free throws, then hit a shot from the field. This stretched out the lead again. And North could not generate any offense when they needed it the most and would finally fall 72-56.

“This makes like 15 quarters in a row where we have not played good defensively,” stated a frustrated coach Augspurger, “We are going in the wrong direction. I am clearly not happy with the way that we have playing. We had a great defensive game against Tri-Village – and we have not done that since.”

“There is no doubt that Wes’s last half of the season has been great,” replied coach Augspurger when asked about Wes Cole, He is playing with a lot of confidence. I think a lot of it is that he is relying on the 3 point shot less, and attacking the basket more. Obviously we need him to keep doing the things that he has been doing. “

On North’s McAdams, “McAdams played well, as a matter of fact he was great. He had a fun night – he did some outstanding things.”

“I thought we started slow,” stated North’s coach King afterwards, “that has been the case the last 6 games. It is tough when you have to fight back from a deficit. We did do some good things tonight. Our defensive pressure was better, but I thought offensively we were lacking.“

About Ryan McAdams game, “He slowed down a bit in the second half, but still had a great game. He is very quick and athletic. He has learned to take what the defense gives him. When he plays within himself he is hard for other teams to handle. What happens is the defense hedges down on him more and that opens things up for the other players. There are 2-3 guys watching what he does, and the other players can cut to the basket. We were able to exploit that and get some layups.”

Scoring for North: “McAdams 29, Edgin 4, Cordes 2, Pitcock 7, Branson 4, Vanbrederode 10. South: Cole 26, Jason Utz 3, Cottingim 7, Bassler 5, Crozier 10, Augspurger 14, JJ Utz 7

TVS Hall of Fame Inductee's

Rea Ann Davis Crews. Sports: basketball, volleyball, and track.

Kathleen Ulrich Carpenter. Academic: class valedictorian, Rotary Honor Scholar, National Honor Society.

Kelli Maggard Ott. Academic: Rotary Honor Scholar, National Honor Society.

Brad Wright. Service: football, cross country, baseball. Coached High School sports, President of WABO, Salem Lutheran Church.

Late Randy Woodard. Sports: Football, basketball, baseball.

Jerry Cooper. Service: FFA, US Army, US Postal Service, Twin Valley Rod and Gun, NRA, Conservation, Salem Lutheran Church.

Tuesday, February 17, 2015

South Drops Two

The Trojans came into their game against South with only 5 wins. But for 4 quarters they gave 14 win Twin Valley South all that they could handle and more. Although South made a couple of good runs, Arcanum was able to come back and gain the lead in the 4^th quarter. With seconds left in the game, South’s Wes Cole hit a shot from the field and tied the ball game. Arcanum set up a play and shot and missed – but Colin Habel, who only had 2 points coming into the 4^th quarter, would score on a put back with .4 seconds left on the clock for a 44-42 win.

South’s starting point guard, JJ Utz, was not dressed for the game due to an ankle injury. In addition, Anthony Augspurger had signed earlier in the day with Walsh College to play football. So there were plenty of distractions for the team. They really struggled to get a rhythm on offense in the first half and were streaky in the second half. Arcanum was up by 5 at the first buzzer. South gradually caught up, thanks in part to Jake Osborn who had a good quarter - scoring 6 of his 10 points. And it was Winston Crozier coming off the bench who tickled the net with a trey right before halftime to give South the lead.

Jacob Bassler and Wes Cole struck early in the 3^rd quarter, both netting 3’s coming out of the locker room. That gave South their biggest lead of the night – 8 points and they seemed ready to break the game open. But Arcanum took a time out and adjusted the pressure on the wings. At quarters end it was 31-all.

The final quarter was a real battle as the lead went back and forth. The Trojan crowd could begin to smell an upset and became very vocal the last 3 minutes of the game. Arcanum had been working hard to prevent South from driving to the basket and they were accumulating fouls – giving up bonus, then double bonus.

With a minute left in the game and the lead, Arcanum went in a slowdown. South resorted to fouling now to get the ball back. And it was South’s Wes Cole who tied the game when he hit a shot from the field to tie it at 42-all with maybe 20 seconds left. Arcanum hastily worked the ball around on offense and took a deep shot but missed. Colin Habel scored 7 of his 9 points in the 4^th quarter. And none was more important than his last basket as he crashed the offensive boards, raked in the rebound and sank the put back with .4 seconds left on the clock. It was chaos on the Trojan bench as the team celebrated the upset.

“I want to give credit to Arcanum’s coach Bixler – he is one of the best,” stated subdued coach Augspurger after the game, “I think he is one of the best coaches in the league. He does a good job of getting his team ready. And I thought they were prepared better than we were. We played like a team expecting to win – and they played like a team with nothing to lose. They were playing loose and excited and we were playing uptight. We were a little out of sync without our point guard. But tonight we were just outplayed.”

South then visited Dayton Christian where they had a slim halftime lead, but had a bad 3^rd quarter. Perimeter shooting provided the offense for Dayton Christian – they would drop 10 treys in the contest. Despite a comeback attempt in the fourth quarter, South would lose 54-49. Wes Cole and Jacob Bassler lead scoring for South with 15 and 13 points respectively. South will wind down their regular season on Friday when they host rival Tri-County North.