First Posted: 3/20/2015
BOWLING GREEN — It was make or break time and Wayne Trace refused to break.
And with that, Delphos St. John’s late-season surge was stopped one game short of the ultimate goal — the state tournament — when Wayne Trace took a 65-56 win in the Division IV boys basketball regional championship game at Bowling Green State University’s Stroh Center on Friday.
The Blue Jays (20-6) fought back from a huge early deficit, then saw their two leading scorers mostly neutralized by a triangle-and-two defense in the second half, but still found themselves in a 43-43 tie with a minute and a half left in the third quarter.
Wayne Trace (25-1) regained the lead on its next possession, though, and the ’Jays never could catch them again.
The Raiders will play Canal Winchester Harvest Prep at 10:45 a.m. Thursday in a Division IV state tournament semifinal.
St. John’s had won nine games in a row and turned a good season into one it hoped would end in Columbus.
But Wayne Trace, a team which scored more than 70 points seven times this season, showed it could play some defense, too. And that might have made the difference in the end.
Wayne Trace led 22-11 after one quarter, but an offensive explosion by Alex Odenweller and Andy Grothouse in the second quarter got St. John’s back into the game and it trailed only 36-32 at halftime.
Odenweller scored 20 points in the first half and Grothouse had 10 when they accounted for all but two of St. John’s points. But Odenweller was held scoreless in the second half and Grothouse got eight points.
“The turnaround was at halftime when we decided we weren’t going to let two guys beat us,” Wayne Trace coach Jim Linder said.
With Wayne Trace guard Luke Miller nearly stapled to his jersey, Odenweller went from hitting 7 of 7, including 4 of 4 on 3-pointers in the first half, to 0 of 4 in the second half.
Miller was a ball boy in 2008, the last time Wayne Trace went to the state tournament. This time, he specialized in keeping the ball away from people instead of getting it to them.
“He was quick and physical and anytime I came off a screen, he was right next to me,” Odenweller said about Miller. “If I had any space at all, it was an inch.”
Miller said Wayne Trace played “awful” on defense in the first half. “But the second half was effort. It was all effort,” he said.
Post player David Sinn led four Wayne Trace scorers in double figures with 15 points. He also had 7 rebounds and 4 blocked shots. Ethan Linder scored 14 points, Corbin Linder had 12 points and Miller scored 11.
“It’s been a unique run since the middle of February for us,” St. John’s coach Aaron Elwer said. “As a team, a lot has been accomplished. Since February, we’ve been as good as a team in a lot of areas as we have been in a long time.
“It’s unfortunate that we came up a little bit short of the ultimate goal,” he said.
Elwer said with Wayne Trace focused on St. John’s outside shooters in the second half the Blue Jays tried to get more scoring inside, but the Raiders were able to find an answer for that strategy, too.
“We had some opportunities but I give some credit to their guys. They challenged a lot of shots and made things difficult for us in the paint,” he said.
“You always want to get off to a good start (in a game) and we didn’t do that. I told our guys at the end of the first quarter that we’d seen them play and they’d give up some leads, so stick with what we were doing. When we got it to four at half, we felt really good about the situation.”
But Wayne Trace, who lost in the regional championship game to eventual state champion Crestview last year, was able to withstand St. John’s best effort and get the trip to Columbus.
