By Dan Messerschmidt

BUCYRUS — Colonel Crawford has a Northern 10 Conference showdown looming with Upper Sandusky on Saturday.

The Eagles did not look past Bucyrus in the meantime.

Colonel Crawford (9-1, 6-0 N10) weathered 11 3-points shots by the Redmen by averaging 22 points per quarter en route to an 89-64 victory at Alex Kish Memorial Gymnasium.

“We’ve got a lot of weapons,” Colonel Crawford coach David Sheldon said. “We share the basketball well. We have 3-4 guys per night in double figures.”

That was a little too much for Bucyrus (1-8, 0-6) to overcome, despite shooting 45 percent from the field, including 61 percent from 3-point range.

“It was good to see that we responded to a good team,” Bucyrus coach Justin Mattix said. “It was a 25-point game, but it was closer than that early.”

Indeed, the Redmen jumped out to a 7-0 lead to start the game before the Eagles answered with an 8-0 run of their own. Bucyrus led for the last time at 13-12 on a 3 by Kade Slagle but Colonel Crawford eased out to a 19-16 after one.

The Eagles’ full-court press began to take its toll, forcing 15 first-half turnovers by the Redmen. Still, Bucyrus was as close as 38-31 on a basket by Harley Robinson with 55 seconds left in the first half. Colonel Crawford scored the last five points of the second quarter to build the lead to 43-31.

“We wanted to speed them up,” Sheldon said. “Turnovers don’t allow you to score. We got more offense off the press.”

The Redmen refused to fold despite the pressure in the third quarter. A pair of 3s from Robinson — who finished with six treys for the game — and another by Slagle cut the deficit to 45-40 at the 6:07 mark of the period.

Bucyrus was within eight with 2:10 left on a basket by Ryan Evans but Gavin Feichtner answered with a 3 to push the Colonel Crawford lead back to double digits, 60-49, and the Redmen could get no closer, trailing 67-53 by period’s end.

“Good players exploit a lot of things on defense,” Mattix said. “In the first half, we have 15 turnovers and it’s a close game. In the second half, they scored the same amount of points and we had five turnovers. We just didn’t play defense.”

The Eagles pulled away in the fourth quarter, using a 16-5 run to start the frame to push the lead to 83-58 before both coaches cleared the benches.

Jordan Fenner finished with 21 points — including three 3s — to lead Colonel Crawford, while Shaum finished with 19 points and 13 rebounds and Cameron McCreary added 18 points. Reis Walker grabbed 10 boards.

“Reis and Harley did a great job controlling the glass,” Sheldon said. “It helps when you have those two flying to the boards.”

Robinson finished with a game-high 22 points for Bucyrus. Gram Dick had 15 points and seven rebounds.

“We had it where we wanted it, for the most part, especially on offense,” Mattix said. “There are two things we have to work on: turnovers and defense. If we limit the turnovers, this could have been a 6-10-point game.”

“Harley (Robinson) is a special player,” Sheldon said. “He’s just getting back from missing four games. He had some bombs in the second half.

“We’ve struggled here (in the past), so a 25-point win, you take it,” he added.

Colonel Crawford (6-2, 4-1) also won the junior varsity game, 55-42. Jacob Maley had 19 points and Chase Walker added 18 for the Eagles. Lucas Kozinski topped Bucyrus (1-8, 0-6) with 19 points.

Colonel Crawford   19    24   24    22 — 89

Bucyrus                    16    15   22    11 — 64

Stats

Colonel Crawford (9-1, 6-0 N10) Shots 37-66; 3-pt 8-25 (Jordan Fenner 3, Cameron McCreary 2, Reis Walker, Brody Martin, Gavin Feichtner); Free throws 7-9; Rebounds 32 (Harley Shaum 13); Turnovers 12. Scoring: Reis Walker 3 3 9, Jordan Fenner 6 3 21, Cameron McCreary 8 0 18, Zye Shipman 1 0 2, Brody Martin 3 0 7, Gavin Feichtner 2 2 7, Hayden Bute 3 0 6, Harley Shaum 8 3 19.

Bucyrus (1-8, 0-6 N10): Shots 25-53; 3-pt. 11-18 (Harley Robinson 6, Kade Slagle 2, Dylan Goff, Gram Dick, Ryan Evans); Free throws 3-5; Rebounds 21 (Gram Dick 7); Turnovers 21. Scoring: Gram Dick 7 0 15, Harley Robinson 8 0 22, Ben Seibert 1 0 2, Ryan Evans 3 0 7, Kade Slagle 2 0 6, Dylan Goff 2 0 5, Kyle Hamm 2 3 7.

JV: Colonel Crawford 55-42.