ANSONIA – The Ansonia Tigers defeated the visiting Mississinawa Valley Blackhawks 62-40 in a WOAC matchup. Ansonia came into the night with a 2-6 season record while MV brought a 1-7 mark into the Tuesday night game
“We’ve been struggling – it’s been a tough season,” said Ansonia coach, Tony Overton. “We’ve been able to hang with some teams for a couple of quarters and then, I said it last year, we go through lapses. I told the boys, our stats and record say that we’re a bad team and I refuse to believe that. We are a good team that makes really bad decisions and let’s improve on our decision-making.”
The Blackhawks took an early 3-0 lead and owned an 11-9 lead at the first quarter 1:48 mark before Ansonia battled back to close out the opening period on a 5-0 run to lead 14-11 with one quarter in the book. Ethan Reichert paced the Tigers with eight first-period points including 2-2 at the free throw line.
The neighboring schools continued to battle in second-quarter action with teams battling to a 7-7 standoff in the first six minutes for a 21-18 Ansonia lead before the teams headed to the halftime break with the Tigers holding a six-point 27-21 advantage. The Hawks took advantage of five first-half 3-pointers to keep the game close including three Kyle Wehrkamp treys and a triple each by Bryson Gower and Thomas Bower.
Ansonia’s Ethan Reichert put 12 third-quarter points on the board to lead the Tigers to a 21-8 third-period and a 20-point 46-26 advantage at 2:07 on their way to a 48-29 lead with one quarter to play.
“Early on we got the ball inside to Reichert and he scored,” Overton stated. “We got open threes and then we go four or five minutes and we don’t do it. We go to halftime and we say go inside and then things start working better.”
“When Ethan wants to play he’s a handful,” added Overton. “He’s a free spirit and he doesn’t get rattled – basketball is fun for him.”
Reichert added another 10 points in the fourth quarter to give the 6’2” senior 34 points for the game before going to the bench at 4:04 in the fourth with the game hand and the Tigers on their way to a 22-point conference win.
“We’re still trying to figure out a rotation who we can play, who works well together, and who can actually run an offense,” said Coach Overton. “We’ve had three quarters this season where we scored zero points and it hasn’t been because of the defense, it’s been because we’ve been so complacent so we’re a work in progress and we’ll keep pushing.”
Ansonia improves to 2-3 in conference action and 5-6 overall. MV drops to 0-5 and 1-8 on the season.
BOXSCORE:
ANSONIA – E. Reichert 34, Layne Bowman 9, T. Hemmerich 5, J. Schmitmeyer 5, M. Barga 4, Landyn Bowman 3, B. Lehman 2 – TOTALS 22 7-11 3 62
MISSISSINAWA VALLEY – K. Wehrkamp 11, A. Hunt 9, B. Gower 6, T. Liechty 5, J. Beanblossom 3, T. Bower 3, W. Stump 2, C. Hanes 1 – TOTALS 6 6-4 7 40
3-POINTERS
Ansonia 3 (Landyn Bowman 1, Hemmerich 1, LLayne Bowman 1)
Mississinawa Valley 7 (K. Wehrkamp 3, B. Gower 2, T. Liechty 1, A. Hunt 1)
SCORE by QUARTERS
14-13-21-14 62 Ansonia
11-10-08-11 40 Mississinawa Valley
