{"id":200888,"date":"2025-12-23T23:29:29","date_gmt":"2025-12-24T04:29:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/?p=200888"},"modified":"2025-12-23T23:30:01","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T04:30:01","slug":"kelly-leads-cougars-to-18-point-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2025\/12\/23\/kelly-leads-cougars-to-18-point-win\/","title":{"rendered":"Kelly leads Cougars to 18 point win"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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

Van Wert\u2019s Xavier Kelly put his athleticism on display against Columbus Grove Tuesday night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The 6-0 sophomore guard scored a career-high 28 points, including 19 in the second half to lead Van Wert by the Bulldogs 68-50. He accounted for nine baskets, one of which was a trey, and was 9-of-11 from the foul line.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
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Xavier Kelly (2) pulls up for two of his 28 points against Columbus Grove. Bob Barnes\/VW independent<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

\u201cYou see his emergence as floor leader for us,\u201d Van Wert head coach Jeremy Best said. \u201cHe had a lot of floor to work with tonight and when he can get on the open floor and when his decision making is on point, he can be very dangerous for us facilitating and getting to the rim.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite battling foul trouble in the third quarter, Zach Crummey finished with 16 points and 16 rebounds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe ask so much of him because he\u2019s our only physical presence and he\u2019s still a sophomore, so we want him to play hard and we want him to be aggressive,\u201d Best said. \u201cHe\u2019s really starting to learn how to play every possession that really matters but be sensitive to the fact that he needs to stay on the floor for us for a long period of time. He can control the middle of the floor for us and that gives us a nice option when X (Xavier Kelly) is breaking things down.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Cougars (6-2) found themselves down 18-13 after one quarter, with Griffin McCracken supplying a pair of treys in the opening period and Columbus Grove\u2019s Trevon Baxter scoring 10 of his points in the quarter.  Early in the second quarter, Columbus Grove (2-2) went up 23-15 and had the ball, but a hook shot by Crummey, a trey by Kelly and another bucket by Crummey sparked an 11-0 run. By halftime, Van Wert led 28-27.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The third quarter remained close and the Cougars took a 47-41 lead into the fourth quarter, where Van Wert put up a flurry of points to push the lead to 64-47 at one point in the period.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The Cougars were 26-of-51 from the floor and 12-of-15 from the foul line with 32 rebounds, including 10 on the offensive end.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was a good team effort,\u201d Best said. \u201cOnce we settled down and took some control of ourselves on the offensive end and stopped turning it over, we got some stops that led to some easy leakouts and easy buckets for us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Columbus Grove was 22-of-51 shooting but just 2-of-6 from the free throw line with 22 rebounds.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After back-to-back losses, the Cougars have now won three straight games.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI like where our kids are right now, mentally, emotionally and physically,\u201d Best said. \u201cThey\u2019re starting to see the light of conversations we have with them and they\u2019re starting to have a care and concern for their teammates and what each teammate is doing in the process of making us a good team.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Van Wert will return to action Saturday at home against Ottoville.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to take a couple days off,\u201d Best said. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to practice on Wednesday or obviously on Christmas Day \u2013 they\u2019re looking forward to it and we can come back and go Friday and even again Saturday morning and prep for our game that day. The two days come at the right time for us \u2013 we\u2019re at the end of a 12-day, six game stretch and these two days are going to be a blessing for us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Box score<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cougars  13  15  19  21 \u2013 68<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bulldogs  18    9  14    9 \u2013 50<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Van Wert: Xavier Kelley 9-9-28; Griffin McCracken 3-0-9; Keaten Welch 2-1-5; Caden Collins 2-0-1; Zach Crummey 8-0-16; Cohen Bragg 2-2-6<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Columbus Grove: Gavin Baxter 2-1-5; Brady Basinger 4-0-8; Clark Keehn 1-0-2; Gavin Barazza 2-0-4; Trevon Baxter 5-0-10; Landon Best 3-0-6; Gage Sautter 4-1-13; Noah Strahm 1-0-3.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

JV: Van Wert 48-33<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
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Keaten Welch (5) plays tough defense against Columbus Grove. Bob Barnes photo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SCOTT TRUXELL\/independent sports Van Wert\u2019s Xavier Kelly put his athleticism on display against Columbus Grove Tuesday night. The 6-0 sophomore guard scored a career-high 28 points, including 19 in the second half to lead Van Wert by the Bulldogs 68-50. He accounted for nine baskets, one of which was a trey, and was 9-of-11 from […]<\/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-200888","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-07 21:05:48","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\/200888","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=200888"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200888\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":200897,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/200888\/revisions\/200897"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=200888"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=200888"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=200888"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}