Raiders’ tourney exit ‘painful,’ improbable
The YouTube tagline says it all:
Milwaukee’s INSANE 24 point comeback against Wright State.
Anyone clicking on the video will see an implausible underdog story that’s normally found only in movies. Trailing 72-48 and getting close to empty-the-bench time with only 6:15 on the clock, the Panthers rallied to force overtime and then pulled out a 94-92 win in the Horizon League quarterfinals Tuesday.
Of their last 17 possessions of regulation, only two ended in Raider stops.
They scored 33 points in that span, getting almost two points each time they had the ball. If they sustained that clip over 40 minutes, they’d have scored 211 points.
The Raiders (18-6) are ranked 24th in the country in defensive efficiency, allowing a mere .912 points per possession. They went into the tourney as regular-season co-champs and the clear favorite because they could win games with either their offense or defense.
But they ended up on the wrong side of what kenpom. com — a website run by analytics
guru Ken Pomeroy — labeled the most improbable comeback in college basketball this season.
The second-most improbable comeback was also pulled off by the Panthers (10-11). Trailing by 14 with two minutes to go at Cleveland State, they forced OT by going on an offensive splurge, outscoring the Vikings, 21-7, over that stretch on the way to an 81-80 win.
“It’s obviously, for our players, one of — if not THE — most disappointing losses they’ve ever had. And
I would say (it is) for me, too,” coach Scott Nagy said.
Asked about the mood in the locker room, he said: “It’s low. What you’d expect. It’s painful. Life’s painful when you pour your heart into something like that.
“There’s a lot of people who probably never feel like that because most people don’t really, really pour their heart into something and then don’t get it. That’s very painful. But that’s part of what living is like.”
Longtime Wright State followers had a hard time
remembering a loss as difficult to fathom.
In 1993-94, the Raiders faced Pacific in the San Juan Shootout and had a seven-point edge with 19 seconds to go. They blew the lead and lost in overtime.
But the stakes were so much higher in this game — and it seemed to be in the Raiders’ grasp at multiple stages.
They led 75-67 after a Grant Basile layup at 1:02 in regulation. The sophomore forward was sensational with 35 points (most
by a Raider in four years) and 14 rebounds.
They led 79-75 when Tanner Holden hit one of two free throws with 16 seconds to go. But the Panthers hit a 3 with 8.3 seconds left and, after Holden went 2 of 2 on foul shots, made another 3 with 1.3 seconds to go.
The Raiders didn’t help themselves by going 7 of 12 on foul shots in crunch time. They also committed five turnovers, four of them by the usually reliable Trey Calvin.
The sophomore point guard had a career-high six after committing just 34 in the first 23 games.
“Turnovers maybe more than anything hurt us,” said Nagy, whose team also squandered a four-point lead with 2:27 left in OT. “We had too many empty possessions.
“When we got the lead, we probably lost some of our aggressiveness. It’s hard to play that way — when they’re aggressive and you’re not — and you end up turning the ball over.”
Nagy insisted he could have done more to affect the outcome. But apart from having someone foul before allowing the game-tying 3 — an oft-debated late-game strategy — there didn’t seem to be much he could do.
He said words were few after such an abrupt end ... and he doesn’t see much point in rehashing the loss with his players.
“We’re just going to have to give them some time to get away from it, and that’ll be hard because there’s still so much left — the NCAA Tournament and all those things,” he said.
“It’ll take a little time to move past it. But it’ll happen. We’ve done it every year. It’s painful. But like I say, there’s no guarantees in life.”
After 42 years, Waynesville High School’s Tim Gabbard knows a good girls basketball team when he sees one especially
— at this point in the postseason.
The veteran coach knew his team would have its hands full with Worthington Christian. The Warriors outscored the Spartans 11-0 in the fourth quarter en route to a 52-40 victory in a Division III regional semifinal Wednesday at Springfield High School.
“We missed a few shots and they beat us down the floor,” Gabbard said. “We weren’t big enough or strong enough, but we hung with them as long as we could.”
Worthington Christian’s Blessing King led all scorers with 19 points and senior Katherine Weakley added 18.
Sophomore Megan Bailey scored 10 points for Waynesville, while senior Leah Butterbaugh and junior Isabella Cassoni each added nine. The Spartans finished 16-7.
“I’m proud of them,” Gabbard said. “They played hard. We knew (Worthington Christian) was going to be good.”
Waynesville trailed 27-26 at the half, but the Warriors went on a 7-0 run — two putbacks by King and a 3-pointer by Weakley — to grab a 41-35 lead midway through the third quarter.
“We told them we had to keep them off the boards, we just weren’t able to do it,” Gabbard said.
Butterbaugh hit a 3-pointer and Cassoni hit a jumper to make it 41-40 after three quarters
The rest of the game belonged to the Warriors. A jumper by Meghan Mayotte, a 3-pointer by Weakley and back-to-back buckets by King extended Worthington Christian’s lead to 50-40. The Warriors were able to run the clock out in the final two minutes.
“I think we might have run out of gas a little bit,” Gabbard said. “They just beat us down the floor with their length and they could outrun us.”
Waynesville began the season without three starters and got off to a 5-5 start. Once they got healthy, the Spartans went 11-3 the rest of the way. They won a district title for the third time in four seasons.
Waynesville returns four starters next season and five of its top six rotation players.
“We had a good season, we won another district and got back to the regionals,” Gabbard said. “We’ve got a lot of tradition and we’ll get back next year.”
Worthington Christian (241) plays Purcell Marian at 1:30 p.m. Saturday at Springfield High School.
Purcell Marian 49, Anna 44: The Cavaliers took a 41-27 lead on a 3-pointer by Kara King with less than five minutes remaining, but the Rockets would go on a 14-3 run to pull within 44-41 on two free throws by senior Mary Landis with 1:26 remaining.
The Cavaliers hit three of six free throws to extend their lead to 47-41, but the Rockets would again pull within three at 47-44 on a 3-pointer by Kayli Brewer with 25.7 seconds remaining.
Anna wasn’t able to tie the score and was forced to foul. The Cavaliers hit two of three free throws in the final moments.
“I couldn’t be more proud of my two seniors for what they gave us over the last four years,” said Rockets coach Jeff Maurer. “They make me look a lot smarter than I am. I couldn’t be more proud of the fight. I know it hurts and there’s nothing I can say in this locker room that’s going to change that, but the fight they showed right down to the end, not many teams would’ve come back in the fashion that they did.”
Rockets senior Ella Doseck scored a game-high 21 points and reached 1,000 career points. She scored 13 in the second half as the Rockets surged back into the game.
“She’s been doing that for four years,” Maurer said.The Rockets graduate two seniors from their squad that finished 18-8.
“We’ve got some girls who can build off this,” Maurer said.