Redmen knock off Shelby, 38-31, to end 3-game slide

By BRAD FRANK
Gazette Sports Editor

SHELBY — The Belle­vue Red­men knocked off the Shelby Whip­pets, 38–31, on Fri­day in var­sity boys bas­ket­ball action.

Enter­ing the game, Shelby still had North­ern Ohio League title aspirations.

At 6–2 in the league, Shelby needed to win its final two NOL games, while league leader Nor­walk would have had to lose its final two games in order for the two teams to split the NOL title. Friday’s loss ruined Shelby’s chances of doing so, while Nor­walk beat Willard to clinch the league crown out­right for the sec­ond straight season.

Belle­vue demon­strated, a slow delib­er­ate offense Fri­day against Shelby, just like it did in the pre­vi­ous Friday’s game against Norwalk.

The result was Bellevue’s low­est scor­ing game all season.

Belle­vue led 8–4 after the first quar­ter and 12–8 at halftime.

The Red­men tal­lied a game-high 18 points in the third quar­ter, to push their lead to 12 points, 30–18.

Shelby outscored Belle­vue 13–8 in the fourth quar­ter, as the Red­men shot just 6-of-14 from the free-throw line in the period.

Belle­vue coach Mike Raif­s­nider explained why his team uti­lized the same game plan against Shelby as it did against Norwalk.

“When you play against Nor­walk and the type of ath­letes they have, you look at some of the other oppo­nents you go against to see if you can do the same thing,” Raif­s­nider said. “We felt we could exploit some of the peo­ple Shelby had and get our guys who are quicker and can han­dle the ball to beat their guys off the dribble.

“We were delib­er­ate but we weren’t try­ing to stall. We were just try­ing to get the best shot we could get.”

Belle­vue senior Derek Smith led the team in scor­ing Fri­day with 12. Fel­low senior Trent Stamm added nine points. Jalen San­toro and Charles Dendinger posted six apiece.

Shelby was led by Andrew Baird’s eight points, while Grant Fen­ner and Austin Rohde had seven each.

The Red­men fin­ished 8-of-18 from the free-throw line Fri­day, while the Whip­pets did not attempt a free throw.

Belle­vue senior Dal­ton Jarvis returned to action Fri­day for the first time in a month, after being side­lined with an injury. Jarvis prac­ticed Thurs­day for the first time since his injury.

Raif­s­nider described how Jarvis per­formed Fri­day in his return.

“He got on the floor, and his min­utes were lim­ited, but he played well,” Raif­s­nider said of Jarvis, who scored five points Friday.

Bellevue’s upset of Shelby on Fri­day ended a season-high three-game los­ing streak for the Red­men and evened their sea­son record at 10–10 with a 3–6 NOL mark. Shelby dropped to 12–7 over­all and 6–3 in the league.

Raif­s­nider described how it felt to earn a win after the three straight losses.

“I was just proud of the way the kids bounced back, deal­ing with the bit of adver­sity,” he said. “I thought we had a nice week of prac­tice; we refocused.

“We just went out there and played 32 com­plete min­utes of basketball.”

Belle­vue will host Clyde tonight in a non-league con­test, while Shelby will visit Ken­ton also in non-league play.

Shelby’s junior var­sity edged Belle­vue, 47–45, on Friday.

Belle­vue trailed by 14 enter­ing the fourth quar­ter and posted a 20–8 advan­tage in an effort that came up shy.

Casey Evans led Shelby with 13 points, while Bran­don Schnei­der fol­lowed with 12.

Thomas Pressler paced Belle­vue with 14 points, which included four made 3-pointers in the fourth quarter.

Kenyon Missler tal­lied seven for the Red­men, while Shane Miller and Clay Fries each had six.

BOXSCORE
Var­sity
Belle­vue 38
Derek Smith 5–1-12, Jalen San­toro 2–2-6, Charles Dendinger 2–1-6, Trent Stamm 2–3-9, Dal­ton Jarvis 2–1-5. Totals 13–8-38.
Shelby 31
Austin Rohde 3–0-7, Tris­ton Kehres 3–0-6, Andrew Baird 4–0-8, Lucas Bihl 1–0-3, Grant Fen­ner 3–0-7. Totals 14–0-31.
Score by quar­ter
Belle­vue 8 4 18 8 — 38
Shelby 4 4 10 13 — 31

Junior Var­sity
Belle­vue 45
Cole Nor­man 1–0-2, Dylan DeWitt 1–0-2, Kenyon Missler 3–1-7, Quin­ton Brim­mer 1–0-2, Thomas Pressler 5–0-14, Shane Miller 2–2-6, Ross Ger­win 0–2-2, Clay Fries 2–2-6, Grant Vick­ery 2–0-4. Totals 17–7-45.
Shelby 47
Bran­don Schnei­der 4–1-12, Jacob Hostetler 1–2-4, Corey Cox 2–1-5, Tyler Crain 1–1-4, Casey Evans 5–0-13, Tan­ner Orr 4–0-9. Totals 17–8-47.
Score by quar­ter
Belle­vue 11 6 8 20 — 45
Shelby 18 6 15 8 — 47

Posted by Brad Frank on Feb 15 2013. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.