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On this date in area sports history …
Six years ago on this date, Feb. 24, 2003, the Shawnee boys basketball team beat Graham in the sectional tournament. Complete story on the jump.
Published Feb. 25, 2003
BRAVES FLATTEN FALCONS
SHAWNEE BOYS REACH FRIDAY’S SECTIONAL FINAL
By KEITH WALTHER, News-Sun Sports Writer
TROY — It was a matter of execution, precision basketball by the Shawnee boys basketball team.
The Braves did all the things necessary to advance along the tournament trail Monday night, playing superb defense and limiting mistakes while sharing the ball unselfishly on offense.
The result was a 64-40 rout of Graham by the Braves in the Division II sectional semifinal at Troy’s Hobart Arena.
The third-seeded Braves (14-6) advanced to play Tipp City, which beat Northwestern on Monday, at 8:30 p.m. Friday at Hobart for a sectional title. Graham’s season ends at 6-15.
“I think the thing we have relied the most on all year is playing good defense and the kids really did a good job of that tonight,” said Shawnee coach Dave Marshall. “We put some pressure on and forced some mistakes, got some steals. And we executed offensively — no matter what they threw at us.”
And, early on especially, the Falcons threw everything they could at the Braves. Graham’s main point of emphasis was on stopping — or at least slowing down — Shawnee’s high-scoring Ryan Short.
Using a box-and-one and other junk defenses, Graham held Short to six points in the first half but the Shawnee junior got loose for nine in the final two periods to finish with a game-high 15.
“I wasn’t able to get the ball much when they had the box-and-one going but I was able to get some good looks later because we really moved the ball around well as a team tonight,” said Short. “We weren’t going to take anything for granted. We knew that Graham had beat a top-seed (Kenton Ridge) two years ago and we knew what happened to Greenon (this year’s top seed who fell to Indian Lake in the first round). We just went out and played hard.”
“They are a very good team,” said Graham coach Brook Cupps. “You try to make other guys hurt you and they had guys that stepped up like (Richie) Fralick (12 points). But Short finds ways to score and he did that in the second half.”
Graham trailed 16-11 after one quarter and, when Jamey Nicholas sank a short baseline jumper to open second period play, the Falcons had visions of an upset.
“We lost to them by 10 at our place earlier this season so I never got the feeling from our guys that they didn’t think they could win,” Cupps said. “It was just a matter of doing the things we needed to do — like taking care of the basketball — and we didn’t do those things.”
Shawnee answered Graham’s challenge with a 7-0 run that gave it a 23-13 lead with 3:55 left in the first half. After Graham’s Myles Trempe canned a jumper, the Braves answered with another 5-0 outburst on a 3-pointer by Fralick and a driving layup by Andrew Daggett to make it 28-15.
The Braves would increase their advantage to 34-20 on back-to-back field goals by Eric Fleming with 5:30 left in the third. Graham, however, was still hanging around, trailing 52-37, when Short scored an old-fashioned three-point play with 4:08 to play and followed a minute later with a short jumper to make it 57-37 and put the game out of reach.
Garry Bair led Graham with nine points while Spencer Ferst and Trempe added eight points apiece. Sturgill finished with nine points for the Braves.
GRAHAM (40) — G. Bair 4 1-1 9, Ferst 3 2-4 8, Trempe 3 2-2 8, Rogers 1 0-0 2, Cupps 2 1-2 5, Jenkins 1 3-4 5, Evans 0 1-2 1. Totals: 15 10-16 40.
SHAWNEE (64) — Fralick 5 0-0 12, Short 6 3-5 15, Sturgill 3 1-2 7, Fleming 3 0-0 6, Haddix 4 0-0 8, Mounts 2 1-1 5, Stuckey 2 0-0 4, Daggett 1 0-0 2, Hasser 1 0-0 2, Wheeler 0 3-3 3. Totals 27 8-11 64.
Graham 11 18 30 40
Shawnee16 28 43 64
Three-point goals: Shawnee 2 (Fralick 2); Graham 0.
Records: Shawnee 14-6, Graham 6-15.
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