CJ Bailey hit ones of his two point baskets adding to the 21 points and top scoring player of the game. (Press Pros Feature Photos By Julie Wright-Daniel)
DeSales showed Tippecanoe what it takes to win a close game Saturday night while handing the Red Devils their first loss.
By Marcus Hartman for Press Pros
Tipp City, OH — The calendar still reads early January, but Tippecanoe and Columbus DeSales played a tournament-type game Saturday at Pat Wampler Gym.
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The visitors made the plays at the end to pull out a 60-55 win and hand the Red Devils their first loss of the season.
The goal is to win championships, not go undefeated, so Tippecanoe coach Brock Moon expressed no regrets when it was over.
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“It was great for us,” he said. “We have 18 league games and we only get four nonconference games. I made it a point to schedule these type of games, and we got what we asked for: a competitive, physical game.”
DeSales (6-4) jumped out to a 6-0 lead, but Hudson Ganger got the Red Devils on the board with an old-fashioned three-point play.
Colin Turner cut the lead to one, then Tipp big man Bryton Otto scored at the rim to put Tippecanoe on top 7-6.
The first of five lead changes in the first half set up a back-and-forth second quarter, but DeSales came out with a four-point lead thanks to Chase Cromwell’s three-pointer at the buzzer that made it 30-26.
Bryton Otto shooting a lay-up against Desales defender Evan Draher.
DeSales led by as many as eight twice in the third quarter, but the Red Devils (7-1) got it to two points on a pair of free throws by Otto with 1:01 on the clock.
The Stallions responded with a pair buckets back to back to go back up six heading into the fourth. They got the lead back to seven before Tippecanoe tied the game with a 9-2 run midway through the final stanza.
Turner started it with a free throw then David Alvarez hit a three-pointer. Turner scored on a layup off a weave play to cut the deficit to one, but Cromwell hit a pair of free throws to stem the tide momentarily for DeSales.
Or just to set the stage for a dramatic three-pointer?
Tippecanoe leading scorer C..J Bailey sneaked into the corner for a wide open look at the other end, and the senior guard took advantage by burying a game-tying shot with a little more than four minutes to go.
“He’s so good. He’s special,” DeSales head coach Pat Murphy said of Bailey, the reigning Miami Valley League Player of the Year and the league’s leading scorer this season entering the night at 19.0 points per game.
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He ended up with 21 against DeSales, but they didn’t come easy.
“We just tried to take away his airspace, and they did a good job in the first three and a half quarters of getting us to switch on ball screens,” Murphy said. “So we made an adjustment with drop coverage so we wouldn’t switch and then just tried to make him go downhill and shoot contested shots. But he’s so good at finding teammates and shooters. He’s one of the better high school players in the area and in the state, so you just got to do the best you can.”
First quarter bunny shot made by Hudson Ganger.
The Stallions responded with a pair of baskets by veteran guard Daevyn Amankwaah to go back up four and never looked back.
“He’s our senior,” Murphy said. “He’s our heart and soul, and that’s what he does. He just makes plays at the rim when it counts. And he’s been a three-year starter for us, so that’s who we go to in the guts of the game.”
Still down four with a minute to go, the Red Devils had to give fouls to extend the game. DeSales missed three of six free throws, but Tippecanoe wasn’t able to take advantage.
A Bailey layup kept the Red Devils alive down 58-55 with 6.6 seconds left, but Cromwell sank a pair of free throws to ice it. He finished with 16 points while Amankwaah had eight.
Junior forward Grant Weakley added 14 points while LeAndre Marshall-Neal pitched in 10 for the Stallions.
Otto ended up with 14 points while Turner had nine for Tippecanoe.
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Both coaches liked the way the game was officiated — not too many whistles, but not overly physical, either — and seemed to appreciate the chance to see how their teams would react to a tight, evenly matched affair.
For Tippecanoe, that was uncharted territory.
The Red Devils entered the night not only undefeated but nearly unchallenged.
Tipp’s David Alvarez tosses the ball down the court in the first quarter.
They beat fellow MVL Miami division leader Butler by 10 on Tuesday night, their only game decided by fewer than 17 points, so a close game or two could do the them good between now and tournament time.
“When we face a really good defensive team, you’re going to have longer possessions, and I think that’s one thing we didn’t get used to,” Moon said. “We’ve been (scoring) in the 70s a lot, and just because we’re getting easier shots earlier in possessions, I think we have an internal shot clock where we run offense for 20 or 25, seconds and we’re like, ‘Oh, one’s got to go up.’ And it’s like, ‘No, keep working it. Make them make a mistake.’ So those are things we can clean up as we go. Just what our shots look like.”
That said, turnovers and offensive rebounds will be the emphasis when his team watches this film.
“We have to harp on that: When a team gets that many extra chances on the offensive end, it makes it difficult to hang with them,” Moon said. “I thought we did a better job in the second half. I think we only had four or five turnovers in the second half. Maybe some costly ones there at the end, but I thought we did a better job.”
Desales’ Grant Weakley (who scored 14 points for the Stallions) hovers over Tipps Colin Turner (who scored 9 mfor the Red Devils).
DeSales has had a different type season so far.
The Stallions entered with a mark of 5-4, but they counted Chaminade Julienne, Division I Dublin Coffman and rival Columbus Watterson among their losses.
It’s safe to say Murphy’s team is already battle-tested with many more to go before the Division III tournament starts.
“It’s the process,” he said. “We lost a tough one last night to Watterson, who’s 10-1. We lost a tough one Tuesday to Coffman who I think now they’re 8-2.”
They had the lead in the fourth quarter of both of those games but couldn’t hang on.
Saturday night was a different story.
“It gets tight, you know, we look in their eyes and say, ‘These are things we got to get better at and improve on.’ And that’s what everyone’s trying to do with their teams,” Murphy said. “So to make that step forward tonight, we’re just feeling like, hey, we’re trending in the right direction. We got to keep going.”
Tipp’s CJ Baily drives to the basket against Desale’s top scorer Chase Cromwell as Coach Brock Moon watches the time run down.
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