Parker Robinson goes to the glass for two as the Firebirds end Berlin’s upset bid with a 55-35 win at the Taft Coliseum. (Press Pros Feature Photos by Logan Gapen)
The Tigers edged Centerville to set up a matchup for the regional title against Lakota West, which ended the best finish in Olentangy Berlin’s program history.
Columbus, OH – Pickerington Central boys basketball is enjoying a renaissance of sorts this winter, as unexpected as it might have been when its postseason began as a No. 9 seed.
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Following a 12-year period in which they made five Division I state tournament appearances—including winning two championships—and produced talent like current Ohio State starter and 2023 Mr. Basketball honoree Devin Royal, the Tigers stepped back into finishes of 14-9 and 12-12, respectively, the last two seasons.
The winning attitude and high expectations instilled into the program beginning when Eric Krueger was an assistant and throughout his 12-year tenure as head coach, however, never left.
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Central’s return to regional play Thursday night in the Ohio Expo Center’s Taft Coliseum showed how far back the program has come as it gutted out a 63-59 victory over Centerville in a semifinal.
“We’ve just had young teams over the past couple years, and now they’re finally growing up and getting better,” Krueger said. “Getting back to this point is huge for us. We’ve really battled as a coaching staff, but also as a team and as a program, and now we’re in the regional finals again.”
The win sends the Tigers (17-8) to a regional final at 7 p.m. Saturday at the same site against West Chester Lakota West (24-1). The victor will advance to a state semifinal at 7:30 p.m. March 21 at Wright State against Hilliard Bradley or Newark.
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Bryce Curry celebrates after a 55-35 drubbing of Olentangy Berlin.
Centerville, which finished 18-7, made four consecutive state tournament appearances from 2021-24—including winning the title in ’21 and losing to the Tigers for the 2022 championship.
Their latest matchup featured 14 lead changes in the first half.
Central held as big as a five-point lead in the third quarter, but Elks sophomore guard Dash Craver hit a 3-pointer in the closing seconds of the period to give his team a 46-45 lead.
The Tigers opened the final period on a 7-1 run that includes a 3-pointer by Owen Snyder, but they never earned bigger than five-point lead at any point.
With 33.3 seconds to go, Centerville’s Julian Sam hit a pair of free throws to cut Central’s lead to 57-56, but the game quickly turned when the Elks were whistled for a foul and Trey Sam was called for a technical for his reaction to the call with 30.4 remaining.
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Tigers junior guard Albee Moore responded by making four free throws to give his team a 61-56 lead.
Joshua Tyson lines up a shot from the perimeter.
“We’ve got to finish,” Centerville coach Brook Cupps said. “We’ve got to get loose balls, and we gave away enough of them. I thought they got loose balls, and that was the difference in the game. We always say the toughest team wins, and they got every loose ball. At least six points came off loose balls and layups, and just some careless turnovers. They made some shots and made more 3s.”
Centerville’s Julian Sam hit a 3-pointer with 18 seconds to go to cut it to 61-59, but Central held on, with junior guard Jordan Sanders hitting a foul shot with 4.5 seconds to seal it.
“It was a really big team, and you just had to take a deep breath and make the free throws,” Moore said. “We just stayed aggressive and stayed patient. We’re a young team, but being young, we have to stay faster than other teams.”
Moore finished with 19 points and two other juniors, forward Kevin Smith and guard Landon Evans, each scored 13 for the Tigers.
“I felt like we slowed it down a little bit, executed and made our possessions count toward the end,” Evans said. “That helped us a lot. We’ve been showing a lot more poise, just making free throws and knocking down our shots.
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Teddy Porter attempts to score against high-flying Firebird defender Bryce Curry.
“It feels great. We’re really happy. We haven’t been (to a regional final) since Devin Royal was here, so it’s huge for us.”
According to Krueger, a challenging schedule that included losses to other district champions like Toledo Central Catholic, Westerville North, and Newark has his team battle tested with a shot at another state tournament berth on the line.
“We’ll watch as much as we can, and we’ll be ready to go,” Krueger said. “It’s a quick turnaround. This is a tough group of kids. I’m glad we’re finally where we need to be with our rotation and being healthy. That’s been huge for us. We’re a 9 seed, but I feel like we’re just as good as anyone ahead of us.
“This gives us a chance to get better, continue to grow, and we’ve stuck with it. You want to be playing your best basketball in the tournament.”
West Chester Lakota West 55, Olentangy Berlin 35
In the other regional semifinal Thursday in the Taft Coliseum, the longest run in Berlin’s program history ended with a loss to the Firebirds.
Donovon Barrett has been the Bears’ coach since its inception eight seasons ago, and they were coming off a 6-17 finish last winter.
Berlin entered the postseason as the district’s No. 13 seed.
Luca Filia tries to evade Lakota West defender Joshua Tyson
“Last year we went 6-17, so to go to 17-7, we’re just blessed,” junior guard Noah Bruns said. “We put in a lot of work in the offseason, and I couldn’t be more proud of this group. Ultimately, we couldn’t get it done, but we’ll be back next year for sure. We’ve just got to be tougher. We didn’t have a lot of experience this year. Coming in, we knew that, and we got a lot better throughout the year. We knew it was going to take time adjust. Next year we’ll be ready from the go.”
Berlin built a 13-8 lead in the first quarter as Bruns had six points and four rebounds before Lakota West found its footing to take a 22-18 halftime lead. The Bears grabbed eight offensive rebounds during the first half.
“We started off a little slow, which was very surprising on a stage like this,” Lakota West coach Kelven Moss said. “They did a good job executing and made things hard for us. They had about eight offensive rebounds in the first half. It’s hard getting going when you’re not giving yourselves opportunities.
“At this point in the year, we just want to win, and I thought they did a good job of taking our transition away. There’s so much film on us, you’ve just got to find a way to execute.”
Moss said he told his players to “wake up” at halftime, and they responded by building a 41-29 lead in the third quarter behind six points and three rebounds from Bryce Curry and five points including a 3-pointer from Andre Richardson.
Braylon Green attempts to score over a Lakota West defender.
The Firebirds then held the Bears to six third-quarter points.
“We felt real good (at the half),” Barrett said. “We felt like we could compete, and we just kept talking about competing, being physical, and don’t give them too many transition buckets. They were only up four (at the half). In the third quarter we played pretty well, too, stayed in the game and hung around, but in the middle of the fourth, they started wearing us down and we started making mistakes. That’s what happens when you play good teams. Their quickness and their rebounding ability (was tough), but we’ve also got to make some shots. We had some shots that normally we make, and quite frankly, we didn’t make them. They’ve got a lot of things they can throw at you.”
Bruns, a second-team all-district honoree who averaged 21 points during the regular season, finished with 15 points. Sophomore guard Luca Filia added nine points for Berlin, which also has two other key players eligible to return in sophomore wing player Teddy Porter and junior wing player Braylon Green.
“We upset two higher-seeded teams in the district, with the first one being Coffman,” Barrett said. “They were the sixth seed, and seed-wise, that was the largest differential win in the state. Then we won that game (in a district final) at Ohio Dominican, and we felt really good. We didn’t know really how good we could be. We just talked about getting a little bit better. The good sign is that we were playing our best basketball at the end of the season. We were born eight years ago as a public school.”
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