SHAWNEE — Wapakoneta’s Kyle Huffman motivated his team with a dunk that began a 7-0 run at the end of the first half and then the senior Redskin capped off an 11-0 run to begin the second half to propel Wapakoneta past Shawnee 61-49 Friday night.
The win keeps Wapakoneta unbeaten with a 4-0 mark and gives the Redskins a key opening road victory to begin the Western Buckeye League schedule. Shawnee suffers its first loss of the season and the Indians fell to 3-1 for the year and 0-1 in league play.
“This was a real big win for us early in the year ,” Redskin head coach Doug Davis said. “We knew we’re going to have to get through the pressure they put on us and the crowd because if you want a chance to win the league you have to win games on the road.”
Shawnee head coach Mark Triplett said during Wapakoneta’s second and third quarter runs his team couldn’t buy a basket and gave the Redskins the credit for tough defensive stand when it counted.
“They had the momentum swings and they made shots,” Triplett said. “They flat out can just shoot the basketball. We talked about the Huffman kid with our kids and he shot the ball really, really well tonight. I felt every time we made a run, they hit a big shot.”
Triplett added that once his team lost the lead, the Indians did not shoot with confidence and put up some ill-advised shots.
“They blocked some shots early and I thought we went in a little bit tentatively to the rim,” Triplett said. “Sometimes open looks just don’t fall for you in basketball and I thought as we got down a little bit we got out of character and forced some shots we shouldn’t be shooting. But the credit goes to them.”
The 7-0 run at the end of the second half erased a 23-19 advantage that Shawnee had built up by the 4:37 mark of the second quarter and the big double-digit surge by Wapakoneta at the onset of the second half gave the Redskins a 37-23 lead at the 4:41 mark of third period that Wapakoneta would never lose despite several small Shawnee runs.
“We came out in the third and they had picked up their pressure a little bit so we spread the floor there and knocked down some 3’s,” Davis said. “We penetrated and then made some nice kick outs and made some 3-pointers.”
Huffman, who finished with a game-high 18 points, scored eight in the pivotal third quarter run that included two 3-pointers. Redskin junior Nick Schoonover, who notched 14 points, also had two of his four 3-pointers in the third period. Teammate Aaron Good chipped in 13.
Shawnee’s Sean McDonald, one of the few Indians with any offensive consistency, scored 15 points.
“I think we played pretty good defense,” Davis said. “We are not very big. I haven’t looked at the stats but I know I am not going to be very happy when I look at the number of offensive rebounds they had. Other than giving up offensive rebounds I thought our defense was pretty good.”
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