Ontario's deep shooting overwhelms Norwalk

Dec. 18—NORWALK — With just a day to prepare, there were two key points.

"We had to get their three-point shooters off the line, and we had to play harder than them," Norwalk boys basketball head coach Adam Kreischer said of Saturday's non-league game vs. Ontario.

Instead, the Warriors had drilled 10 threes less than a minute into the third quarter, and finished with 15 offensive rebounds on 29 missed shot attempts.

The end result was a 41-22 scoring advantage in the second half of a 75-53 win at Norwalk High School.

"We talked about those two major things coming off our game plan," Kreischer said. "And clearly neither of those things happened, and that's the outcome we get."

The Truckers (3-3) led 17-16 after one quarter and trailed just 34-31 at halftime despite the Warriors already having eight 3-pointers.

Ben Rothhaar scored six of his 10 points in the first quarter, while Braedyn Demuth scored seven points. Ashton Coe scored on a layup between two defenders with 37.5 seconds left in the quarter to give the Truckers the lead.

Trailing 21-17 with a little more than six minutes left before halftime, Norwalk had its best stretch with an 8-0 scoring run. Demuth drilled two more 3s around a Rothhaar basket for the eight points in a 1:24 span.

But soon after, Ontario's Grayson Purvis made consecutive 3s. After Rothhaar trimmed Norwalk's deficit to 29-27, Gage Weaver made his own three and added a basket with just 3.3 seconds left in the half for the 34-31 lead.

Once Ontario's Brady Zehe and Braxton Hall opened the first 50 seconds of the third quarter with 3s, the Truckers were in trouble. Hall and Zehe then each scored in transition off a Norwalk turnover and missed shot. In just 3:32, Norwalk found itself trailing 47-31.

Later in the quarter, Ontario missed a foul shot that one of its players then rebounded for a putback basket. The Warriors led 56-41 through three quarters, then added a 19-12 scoring edge in the final eight minutes.

"I think a little had to do with energy, but a lot had to do with the confidence and aggression of some of our guys," Kreischer said. "I don't need to name the names of every single person I'm talking about, but we have two guys on our team right now that consistently compete with effort, energy and confidence at all times.

"And if we don't get guys to join them, we're going to struggle at times."

Demuth finished with 20 points on 7-of-14 shooting to pace the Truckers. Rothhaar added five rebounds to go with his 10 points, while Garrett Demuth had eight points and six rebounds.

Mason Gamble added six points, four assists and three rebounds, and Coe also had six assists.

Norwalk (1-2 SBC Lake) entertains Vermilion (3-5, 1-2) on Friday before a rugged five-game stretch awaits.

"That next game is a big game and we need to get back on the winning track," Kreischer said. "We don't want to go through long losing streaks, and yes there is a tough part of our schedule coming up. But we need more guys stepping up.

"We don't need guys trying to go outside of what they are capable of doing and forcing things, but take advantage of the opportunities that are presented to them. We have two of them right now, and we're going to have to have some guys join them if we're going to win games."

Kreischer added his team has already shown themselves what they are capable of with a 50-49 loss at unbeaten Tiffin Columbian (6-0) in a Dec. 2 loss.

"I don't know what Columbian will be ranked when the state poll comes out, but we went over to their place and executed the game plan perfectly with everyone playing to their ability and lost by one with a chance to win at the buzzer," Kreischer said. "But then tonight, Ontario isn't a bad team and they shot it really well ... but the things we talked about doing is what they killed us with.

"They killed us with effort and energy," he added. "They missed 29 shots but had 15 offensive rebounds. So we're giving up offensive rebounds every other shot they attempt, and that won't end up well for you, and it tells you which team is playing harder."

Norwalk held on for a 52-50 win in the junior varsity game. Landon Bennett scored 17 points, followed by Jordan Parriot with 12 and Brock Kuhn with nine.

ONTARIO (4-1)

Gage Weaver 4-3—13; Jayden Leach 0-1—1; Brady Zehe 4-2—13; Grady Schroeder 2-2—8; Braxton Hall 8-1—20; Bodpegn Miller 2-0—4; Carter Weaver 5-0—10; Grayson Purvis 2-1—7. TOTALS 27-10—75.

NORWALK (3-3)

Ashton Coe 1-0—2; Mason Gamble 3-0—6; Braedyn Demuth 7-2—20; Brayson Malson 1-0—2; Dalton Chapin 1-0—2; Landon Ferkel 1-1—3; Garrett Demut 4-0—8; Ben Rothhaar 5-0—10. TOTALS 23-3—53.

Ontario 16 18 22 19 — 75

Norwalk 17 14 10 12 — 53

3-point FGs: (O) Zehe 3, Hall 3, Schroeder 2, Purvis 2, G. Weaver; (N) B. Demuth 4

JV: Norwalk, 52-50