Cougars shoot well, down Bath 62-42

SCOTT TRUXELL/independent editor

LIMA — Once Van Wert got on a roll, the Cougars were nearly unstoppable.

The Cougars put together their best shooting night of the season and won the Western Buckeye League finale, 62-42 over Bath on Friday. The victory snapped Van Wert’s 10-game losing streak.

“The first word that comes to mind is finally,” Van Wert head coach Ben Laudick said. “The last three Fridays we’ve been in position at halftime into the third quarter and even into the fourth quarter but we weren’t able to find a way to win. We finally did that tonight, getting stops, making shots and going to the free throw line and shooting with confidence and knocking those down.”

“I’m real proud of our guys – they’ve hung in there,” he continued. “They could have bailed on the season multiple times but their competitive nature has shown through week in and week out against a very tough regular season schedule.”

The Cougars (4-18, 1-8 WBL) jumped out to a 6-0 lead halfway through the first quarter and went on to lead 11-5 at the end of the period, with seven points coming from Kaden Shaffer. Van Wert then opened the second quarter with an 11-0 run, including back-to-back elbow jumpers by Keaten Welch and a triple by Shaffer. The lead ballooned to 32-15 when Shaffer drilled a trey from the top of the key with 1:10 left in the second quarter. Shaffer, a senior guard, finished with 16 points in the first half and the Cougars led 34-19 at the break.

“I’ve been able to coach a lot of good kids and a lot of tough competitors and I would put him on my ‘all-competitive team,’” Laudick said of Shaffer. “He might be listed at 5-9, but he’s 5-7 and sometimes he plays 6-7 because of his competitive nature, his heart and his will to win. I feel good for him because he played soccer and they didn’t win any games this year and to see him when we won earlier this year, just the look on his face and tonight – to see the smile on his face is pretty cool.”

Van Wert kept the pedal to the metal in the third quarter and extended the lead to 44-23 when Cohen Bragg hit a trey with 3:50 left in the period. The Cougars led 46-30 to begin the fourth quarter but Bath seemed to gain some momentum and trailed 49-38 with 3:40 left. Keyed by Rylan Miller, Van Wert went on a 9-0 run to boost the lead back to 20. Miller, a 6-2 senior, scored seven of his 11 points in the fourth quarter, including two baskets and three foul shots.

“Rylan has bought into his role,” Laudick explained. “He knows his role is to defend, rebound and shoot two-foot shots when his teammates attack. He was beating himself up two Fridays ago when we were down at Kenton and he went 0-5 from the free throw line. He went to the free throw line tonight and shot with confidence and made some crucial free throws for us.”

Conner Campbell also came up big in the fourth quarter by scoring seven of his 15 points.

Overall, Van Wert shot 22-of-40 from the floor, including 5-of-11 from three point range, and 13-of-16 from the foul line with 23 rebounds. Bath was 16-of-36 shooting, including 0-of-9 from beyond the three point arc. The Wildcats also went 10-of-11 from the foul line with 19 rebounds. Zavier Tickle led Bath (2-20, 0-9 WBL) with 15 points, while Jaxson Foster added 14 points.

The Cougars will travel to Celina for the Division II sectional semifinals at 7 p.m. Tuesday. The Bulldogs won the regular season matchup against Van Wert 65-61.

“We have some film on them and it’s a short turnaround,” Laudick said. “We’ve got a couple of days to prepare and everybody is 0-0. We really have no pressure on us, they have to defend their home court. It’s a tough place to play and they’re a senior-led basketball team just like we are so we know that it’s going to be a difficult game.”

“We feel we didn’t play our best game down there,” he added. “We didn’t put a full game together but we’re hoping to go do that Tuesday night.”

Box score

Cougars 11 23 12 16 – 62
Wildcats 5 14 11 12 – 42

Van Wert: Gage Stemen 1-0-2; Kaden Shaffer 6-0-16; Conner Campbell 5-5-15; Rylan Miller 4-3-11; Keaten Welch 5-3-13; Cohen Bragg 1-0-3; Landyn Sudduth 0-2-2

Bath: Dagan Hawkins 1-1-3; Trey Crawford 2-2-6; Logan Markley 2-2-4; Jaxson Foster 6-2-14; Zavier Tickle 6-3-15

JV: Van Wert 32-22