{"id":114355,"date":"2019-03-05T22:44:40","date_gmt":"2019-03-06T03:44:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thevwindependent.com\/news\/?p=114355"},"modified":"2019-03-05T22:45:21","modified_gmt":"2019-03-06T03:45:21","slug":"knights-jump-out-early-beat-dsj-53-34","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2019\/03\/05\/knights-jump-out-early-beat-dsj-53-34\/","title":{"rendered":"Knights jump out early, beat DSJ 53-34"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

SCOTT TRUXELL\/<\/strong>independent sports editor<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

ELIDA — For all intents and purposes, Tuesday night\u2019s Division IV district semifinal game between Crestview and Delphos St. John\u2019s was over in the first quarter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Using a stifling defense and a balanced offense, the Knights jumped out to an 18-0 advantage and led 20-3 at the end of the period, and while the Blue Jays later made things interesting, Crestview rolled to a 53-34 victory at the Elida Field House.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"
Derick Dealey puts up a shot against Griffin Hamilton during Tuesday night’s district semifinal game at Elida.<\/strong> Wyatt Richardson\/Van Wert independent<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The No. 1 seed Knights (23-1) will face Kalida Friday night in the district championship game. The Wildcats (19-5) defeated Wayne Trace 54-39 in the second game of the night. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Javin Etzler and Derick Dealey each scored six points in the opening quarter, while Wade Sheets added four. Isaac Fairchild\u2019s trey with 2:12 left in the period accounted for the only points for the Blue Jays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou couldn\u2019t have scripted it any better,\u201d Crestview head coach Jeremy Best said of the fast start. \u201cWe needed that because we knew Delphos St. John\u2019s is tough, well coached and executes well.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s certainly not the start you draw up or imagine, but it was kind of our season in a nutshell,\u201d Delphos St. John\u2019s coach Aaron Elwer said. \u201cIt was an adversity filled year from the get go with injuries, but we weren\u2019t going to start not competing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Delphos St. John\u2019s (16-8) outscored the Knights 15-6 in the second quarter, including halftime buzzer beating triple by Jared Wurst to trim Crestview\u2019s lead to 26-18. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe play at the end of the second quarter was huge,\u201d Best said. \u201cWe went a little too early on our action and they hit a three to cut it to eight, and I was a little worried when we came out in the third quarter that they would take the momentum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

After a layup by Wade Sheets to open the third quarter, a pair of foul shots by Lucas Metcalfe and a right corner trey by Aiden Rode pulled the Blue Jays to within five, 28-23 with 4:50 left. However, the Blue Jays would not score again in the period. Sheets hit a free throw, Kalen Etzler connected on a pair of foul shots and Javin Etzler beat the buzzer with a bucket to extend Crestview\u2019s lead to 10, 33-23. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t always know how kids are going to respond, but when you have veterans you put a lot of faith that they\u2019ll rally the troops so to speak and really make us (coaches) meaningless on the sideline because they\u2019re the ones playing the game,\u201d Best said. \u201cI think that\u2019s what I was most pleased with.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two free throws by Javin Etzler and a layup by Kalen Etzler pushed the advantage to 37-23 a minute into the fourth quarter, and the Knights later went on to use the foul line, going 10 of 12, to keep the Blue Jays at bay. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a reason they\u2019re 23-1,\u201d Elwer said of the Knights. \u201cYou fight back but they have some firepower and they\u2019re not going to give you anything.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Javin Etzler and Derick Dealey each led Crestview with 14 points, including a 7-for-7 performance from the free throw line by Dealey. Kalen Etzler finished with 11 points and Sheets tallied 10. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jared Wurst was the only Blue Jay to reach double figures (15).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Friday night\u2019s district championship game against Kalida will tip off at 7 p.m. and the winner will advance to the regional semifinals Tuesday at Bowling Green State University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scoring summary<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crestview 20 6 7 20 \u2013 53
St. John\u2019s 3 15 5 11 \u2013 34<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crestview: Kalen Etzler 4-2-11; Wade Sheets 3-4-10; Javin Etzler 6-2-14; Drew Kline 1-0-2; Colton Lautzenheiser 0-1-1; Brant Richardson 0-1-1; Derick Dealey 3-7-14<\/p>\n\n\n\n

St. John\u2019s: Lucas Metcalfe 1-3-5; Jared Wurst 4-6-15; Brady Parrish 1-0-2; Aiden Rode 2-0-6; Isaac Fairchild 2-1-6<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SCOTT TRUXELL\/independent sports editor ELIDA — For all intents and purposes, Tuesday night\u2019s Division IV district semifinal game between Crestview and Delphos St. John\u2019s was over in the first quarter. Using a stifling defense and a balanced offense, the Knights jumped out to an 18-0 advantage and led 20-3 at the end of the period, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-114355","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-04 01:28:20","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114355","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114355"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114355\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114355"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114355"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114355"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}