Boys basketball notebook: Wagner hits clutch ‘money’ shot against Spencerville

LIMA — With a play called “Money,” you bet Ottawa-Glandorf’s Alex Wagner cashed in on the opportunity.

Wagner, a 6-foot-2 senior guard who comes off the bench, hit an uncontested 3-pointer from the right corner — his only shot attempt of the game — to tie the Titans’ game against Spencerville with 13 seconds in regulation. His triple sparked a 56-52 overtime victory in the Division III district championship game at Lima Senior.

Colin White scored 34 points and pulled down nine rebounds in the game. With the Titans trailing by three at the end of regulation, the 6-foot 6, Ohio State signee White was more of a decoy on an in-bounds play.

“I set a screen for Colin, and I knew they’d collapse down on him,” Wagner said. “I got to the corner. They saw I was open, and I saw the ball coming, and I was confident.”

Spencerville tried a three of its own at the buzzer, which bounced off the rim. In overtime, the Bearcats jumped out to a quick two-point lead when Will Sensabaugh had a steal and a layup, but White had two more buckets, and Caden Erford hit a pair of free throws to seal the win. Overall, O-G hit 10 of 11 attempts from the charity stripe.

The Titans (22-3), winners of their last six games, face Toledo Emmanuel Christian, which beat Archbold on Saturday night in Napoleon. They’ll play at 8 p.m. Wednesday at Bowling Green State University in their fourth-straight regional.

Spencerville finished the season 20-5 after bowing out to the Titans last year too. The Bearcats struggled at the free-throw line, hitting 9 of 18 attempts and missing an opportunity to put the game out of reach when they led by as many as seven points halfway through the third quarter.

“That was a heavyweight fight,” O-G coach Tyson McGlaughlin said. “I have the utmost respect for Spencerville. They’re tough kids, and they’re far from done with that young team. Their best basketball is still ahead of them.”

The game was played before a sellout crowd at Lima Senior, with many fans standing in the aisles next to the walls throughout the game. They brought plenty of noise to support both teams.

“Our defense was really good, especially our help defense,” said Spencerville coach Kevin Sensabaugh. “We really tried to get in the gaps and not let White get into the paint. I thought we did a pretty good job. He’s just a great player. He had 34, and I thought we did well on him. We didn’t let the other guys hurt us until the one three at the end.”

Rookie slows down a veteran

FINDLAY — Before fans or other teams noticed it, Trevick Bertke’s Shawnee teammates saw it. The 6-6 freshman point guard could play defense.

That skill was on display for all four quarters of Shawnee’s 53-45 win over St. Marys in the championship game of the Division II boys basketball district at Liberty-Benton on Saturday night when he made life difficult for the Roughriders’ leading scorer, 6-7 senior Evan Angstmann.

That win sent Shawnee (19-6) to the Division II regional tournament at Bowling Green State University, where it will play Shelby (23-2) in a semifinal game on Thursday.

Angstmann scored 18 points and went over 1,000 points in his career Saturday night. But Shawnee limited the damage he could do from long range by holding him to two 3-pointers — one in the first quarter and the other in the final 30 seconds of the game.

“He’s a tremendous player and an awesome kid. He made nine threes in a game this year. If he gets going like that, you can’t beat them,” Shawnee coach Mark Triplett said.

“We had to use our length. You have to follow him wherever he is on the floor, make sure you’ve got a hand on him. Trevick was terrific at doing that, chasing him around and hounding him. He made his shots because he’s really good but it didn’t come easy for him and that’s what we needed.”

Shawnee broke out of a 40-40 tie in the final five minutes of the game to earn its trip to the regional.

The Indians ended the game on a 13-5 run, which was powered by defense, Triplett said. “Stops, we got stops. We got critical defensive stops. We used our length and we didn’t give them second chances. We finished out possesions and boxed out on rebounds. We made enough plays offensively late,’ he said.

Shawnee scored 10 unanswered points to take the score from 40-40 to 50-40 before St. Marys scored again with a minute left to play.

“Our coach was preaching to us, ‘Win these last five minutes, win these last five minutes.’ He really put it on us to go battle with them and we ended up coming out with it,” said Beckett Bertke, who led Shawnee’s scoring with 19 points.

P-G’s headed to BG

ELIDA — Two league championships and now titles at the sectional and district levels.

So many teams have tried to get in Pandora-Gilboa’s way this season, and almost every single time a challenge has been placed in their path, the Rockets have found a way to come out on the winning end.

On Friday night at the Elida Fieldhouse, Pandora-Gilboa met Delphos St. John’s with the district title on the line, and the Rockets used an all-out defensive effort to shut down the Blue Jays and advance to regionals with a 56-43 victory.

Pandora-Gilboa held Delphos St. John’s to 16 of 44 from the floor (36%) and contained Cameron Elwer, the MAC Player of the Year who averages 28 points per game, to 15 points on four three-pointers and three free throws.

“All the credit goes to our kids,” Pandora-Gilboa coach Mike Lee said. “We got after it defensively and we cleaned up the things we didn’t do well against them (St. John’s) a month and a half ago. It wasn’t perfect tonight, but I thought we gave them a lot more trouble on defense than what we did in the regular season.”

Pandora-Gilboa suffered one of its two losses to St. John’s, 57-48, in late January. Cameron Elwer scored 32 points in that win for the Blue Jays, but using a variety of players on defense, the Rockets cut Elwer’s point total in half on Saturday night.

“We tried to rotate in as many players as we could against him,” Lee said. “He’s just an outstanding basketball player. We thought keeping as many guys fresh against him as we possibly could would give us the best chance to slow him down.”

Elwer entered the night hampered by a soft tissue injury in his hip that he reaggravated on Tuesday night against Miller City. He took all nine of his field goal attempts from beyond the arc and drew a pair of trips to the line.

Delphos St. John’s coach Aaron Elwer said after the game that they weren’t sure if his son would be able to give it a go tonight until just hours before the tip.

“It’s been a whirlwind the past few days to try and give him an opportunity to compete tonight,” Elwer said of Cameron Elwer. “He got the go-ahead from the doctor and he wanted to give it a shot knowing that he couldn’t do any more damage than what had already been done. He is who he is. He’s a great player who loves to compete and he gave everything he had.”

Aiden Harris paced Pandora-Gilboa with 14 points, followed by Colin Harris with 11. Four other Rockets scored at least six points in the game.

“We got some quality minutes from a lot of different individuals and that’s what you need because that’s what makes a quality basketball team,” Lee said. “Teams are going to take things away from you this time of year and make life much more difficult on you, but when you have other kids step up like we did tonight, that’s why we’re moving on.”

Priddy silences Marion Local

WAPAKONETA – Lima Central Catholic had the lead for only 5 ½ minutes of the last 30 minutes in its 41-35 win over Marion Local in the Wapakoneta Division IV boys basketball district championship game Friday night, but they were the most important 5 ½ minutes.

After looking up at the scoreboard and seeing Marion Local with leads as big as six, seven, and finally eight points throughout the first three quarters, the Thunderbirds finished strong to claim their district championship.

LCC (24-2) will play Old Fort (21-5) at 8 p.m. Tuesday in a Division IV regional semifinal at Bowling Green State University’s Stroh Center.

The LCC-Marion Local game was billed as a match-up of LCC’s quick three-guard offense against Marion Local’s twin towers, 6-9 Jack Knapke and 6-8 Austin Niekamp, who were as advertised in the early going.

But it was combining seven 3-pointers — four of them in the first quarter — with that inside game which allowed Marion Local (12-14) to get ahead and keep LCC on upset alert deep into the game.

Marion Local led 19-16 at halftime and had its biggest lead of the game, 30-22, with three minutes left in the third quarter after Grant Kremer connected on a three-pointer.

But LCC cut the Flyers’ lead to 30-27 at the end of that quarter on back-to-back buckets by Billy Bourk and DeMarr Foster’s free throw.

That was the beginning of a 19-5 run for the Thunderbirds in the game’s last 10 minutes, which included holding Marion Local to one point in the first seven minutes of the fourth quarter.

LCC regained the lead for the first time since the opening minutes of the first quarter when Carson Parker hit two free throws to make it 33-31 with 5:32 to play.

But it was Jordan Priddy’s 3-pointer that increased the lead to 36-31 with 2:40 left in the game, which had the same kind of devastating effect as an explosive play for a touchdown in football. It was a big sign LCC now had things under control.

“Oh, man. That three was huge,” LCC coach Sean Powell said.

Priddy, a 6-2 sophomore who led LCC with 14 points, said, “Once that shot hit the whole atmosphere changed, the momentum shifted, and then we knew from that point on it was our game.

“That felt amazing. That whole possession my hands were twitching. I was feeling for that shot. Once it hit my hands it was money.”

Big scorers

Several area boys basketball players topped the 15-point plateau in recent games:

• Colin White of Ottawa-Glandorf had 24 points in a 16-point victory over Liberty Benton.

• Landon Horstman of Ottoville scored 24 points in a loss to Pandora-Gilboa.

• Beckett Bertke had a game-high 23 points for Shawnee in a win over Napoleon.

• Aiden Harris led Pandora-Gilboa with 21 points in a 53-48 district semifinal win over Ottoville.

• Evan Angstmann of St. Marys scored 21 points in a 65-51 district semifinal win over Elida.

• Owen Sensabaugh paced Spencerville with 18 points in a 17-point victory over Wayne Trace.

• Cameron Elwer of Delphos St. John’s tallied 17 points in a 46-38 district semifinal win over Miller City.

• Carter Sudhoff of Spencerville scored 16 points in a district semifinal win over Wane Trace.

• A’mari Wash of Elida scored 15 points in a loss to St. Marys.

• Jordan Priddy of LCC scored 18 points in a 15-point win over New Bremen.

BOYS BASKETBALL RESULTS AND SCHEDULE

Tuesday

Games ended after The Lima News deadline. Find scores, game stories, photos and more on LimaScores.com.

D-IV Regional Semifinals at Bowling Green

Pandora-Gilboa vs Toledo Christian, 6 p.m.

LCC vs Old Fort, 8 p.m.

Wednesday

D-III Regional Semifinals at Bowling Green

Ottawa-Glandorf vs Tol. Emmanuel Christian, 8 p.m.

Thursday

D-II Regional Semifinals at Bowling Green

Shawnee vs Shelby, 8 p.m.

Friday

D-IV Regional Finals at Bowling Green

TBD, 7 p.m.

Saturday

D-III Regional Finals at Bowling Green

TBD, 2 p.m.

D-II Regional Finals at Bowling Green

TBD, 4 p.m.

GIRLS BASKETBALL RESULTS AND SCHEDULE

Thursday

D-IV State Semifinals at Dayton

Crestview vs Fort Loramie, 1 p.m.

D-III State Semifinals at Dayton

Ottawa-Glandorf vs Portsmouth, 8 p.m.

Saturday

D-IV State Championship at Dayton

TBD, 10:45 a.m.

D-III State Championship at Dayton

TBD, 2 p.m.