It’s a first half the Shawano Community High School boys basketball team will want to forget.
But it was a second-half flurry that almost earned the Hawks a victory on Thursday night.
Down 20 points with 12 minutes remaining, Shawano got within 3 points, but New London drained four free throws in the final minute to earn a 64-60 Bay Conference victory in Shawano.
“It would have been nice to have an extra two minutes in the game,” Shawano coach Dave Ambrosius said. “We just got started a little too late. Credit to them; they made their free throws down the stretch to just keep us far enough off that we just couldn’t get over that hump.”
Shawano got down big because it couldn’t hold onto the ball against New London’s press. With the Hawks up 7 early, the Bulldogs (4-10, 3-4 Bay) went on a 25-2 run, which caused numerous Shawano errant passes and three timeouts by Ambrosius. Shawano (5-8, 4-3 Bay) ended up with 14 first-half turnovers.
“We hopped into that press and we’ve been working on it a little bit, and for some reason it just really clicked this time,” New London coach Kurt Schommer said. “The guys were reading off of one another. … With that press we weren’t allowing them to get into the flow of their offense, which really helped to keep the ball out of (Zeke Gueths) hands.”
“They ran their press really, really well and it got us flustered and got us kind of out of rhythm – we were definitely rushing a little bit,” Ambrosius said. “We did not execute our press break the way that we know how to. … All of a sudden a bunch of turnovers and they had all the momentum there going back down the stretch to end the first half.”
Down 53-33, Shawano made a furious comeback. However, the Hawks never had a shot to tie or win the game.
Sophomore Kaden Richards had a big second half. He hit his first three 3-pointers and finished with 13 second-half points.
“Kaden really caught fire there in the second half,” Ambrosius said. “He hit some shots and he definitely got some confidence going there and it got our team confidence, it got us going as well.”
The Shawano players were fired up at halftime knowing they let opportunities slip away in the first half.
“They were pretty upset at themselves given how they performed against that press,” Ambrosius said. “They know that they’re better than that and they know that they underperformed. We were definitely fired up, and I think it showed in the second half.”
After New London pushed its lead to 51-31, the Hawks went on an 11-2 run as Tyrell Hesse scored six points and Joshua Mueller hit a big 3-pointer to make it 53-44 with 5:37 remaining in the game.
The Hawks got it down to three, 60-57, as Gueths got an offensive rebound, putback basket and was fouled. He converted the 3-point play with 1:01 left.
After a pair of free throws by New London’s Hunter Zaddack and a free throw by Shawano’s Jacob Lacy, the Hawks got a steal. Cole Nelson launched a 3 that missed with 15 seconds remaining. A putback by Gueths – who scored a game-high 23 points — with 1.8 seconds left pulled Shawano back to within 3, but Kyle Wolf hit one of two free throws to ice the game.
Shawano, which finished with 19 turnovers, shot 46.7 percent from the field, but 70.9 from inside the arc. It was the 3-pointers, 4 for 21, that really hurt the Hawks.
New London hit 52 percent of its shots.
It was New London’s Will Wohlt who torched Shawano in the second half. He hit six baskets – from inside and outside – and tallied 14 points down the stretch.
New London (64)
Winkler 2 1-3 5, Zaddack 5 4-6 15, Wolf 5 2-4 16, Oberstadt 1 0-2 2, Wohlt 6 1-2 14, Johnson 2 0-0 6, Wunderlich 1 0-0 2, Kurth 1 0-0 4.
Shawano (60)
Richards 6 0-0 15, Nelson 1 0-0 3, Bartz 1 2-4 4, Kohl 2 0-0 5, Gueths 5 8-11 23, Hesse 3 0-1 6, Mueller 1 0-0 3, Lacy 0 1-2 1.
New London 32 32 – 64
Shawano 20 40 – 60
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