NORTH ROBINSON (Crawford County Now) — Every journey starts with a first step.
In basketball parlance, the first step on the tournament trail is the sectional. Colonel Crawford treats it like a foregone conclusion.
The No. 1 seeded Eagles shot lights out, hitting 32 of 49 from the floor, to dispatch Northern 10 Athletic Conference and county rival, Bucyrus, 76-33, in their Division VI sectional final at Mac Morrison Gymnasium.
The championship was the 15th straight for Colonel Crawford (20-2). It also accounted for the 10th 20-win season in coach David Sheldon’s 20 years at the helm and 15th in Colonel Crawford history.
The Eagles will face N10 foe Wynford — a 65-56 winner over Mohawk — in the district semifinal at Willard on Wednesday.
“I thought we were very efficient offensively the first half to get to 50 points in the half,” Sheldon said. “We did a good job of running the floor and Brayden (Holt) passing ahead. We got some easy buckets in transition.”
The Eagles were a nifty 21 of 32 (66%) on action shots in the first two periods, which included six 3-point shots on just 10 tries.
To their credit, the Redmen did a yeoman’s job defensively on post Payne DeGray, holding him scoreless in the first half and two points for the game.
“That was the goal. Let’s not let them just destroy us at the rim, make them earn it from the arc,” Bucyrus coach Brian Hargis said. “And they did. They earned it, basically, every spot they caught the ball.
“The boys stuck to the gameplan. We knew that might be an issue where they’d hit 12-14 3s on us.”
Balanced scoring more than made up for the Payne DeGray deficit. Holt led all scorers with 20 points, Peryton Baker hit four 3s on his way to 14, Parker Weithman matched that with 14 of his own, and John DeGray added 10 in limited minutes.
“That’s what makes us so tough to guard,” Sheldon said. “We have four guys in double figures and Payne DeGray only has two points.”
Bucyrus (2-20) shot a respectable 40% but only got 33 attempts to 49 for Colonel Crawford. And even a usual bugaboo, turnovers, wasn’t a major contributor to defeat, despite full-court pressure. The Redmen committed 15 on the night.
“We honestly didn’t take care of the ball too bad,” Hargis said. “We had some small moments we did some silly stuff. For us, that’s one of our low games.”
Junior Carson Witten had one of his best games of the season with 16 points to lead Bucyrus. The Eagles held N10 second team selection Dylan Coppler to seven points, though he grabbed five rebounds, and point guard Charlie Randall had just a single point.
“A lot of our focus was on Coppler. He’s a good player, an all-league player and Witten had a great game,” Sheldon said. “Credit Bucyrus. They played hard the entire time. Coming into tonight, with their season, these kids played their tales off for 32 minutes and that’s a credit to these kids and their hard work.”
“He’s starting to find his outside shot,” Hargis said of Witten. “He’s got a bright future. If Charlie wants to do it, it’ll get done. We finally have some numbers in that freshman class.”
Not discounting the importance of his team cutting the nets in their 15th straight sectional, Sheldon makes it clear its merely a means to an end.
“We definitely have bigger goals,” Sheldon said. “It’s a two-game tournament in Willard. We got to go back to a district tournament and that’s our goal every year. The attention to detail will be magnified as we move forward.”
Coppler was the lone senior who played his last game for Bucyrus.
“It’s hard to say goodbye to Cop,” Hargis said. “He’s been a great teammate no matter what class he was in. He held his head high and tried to get the group to follow. Big shoes to fill for that junior class.”
The district will be like old home week for the Eagles, not just because of their repeated trips, but this year’s opponent, Wynford, as well.
They’ll know us and we’ll know them,” Sheldon said. “It’s going to come down to execution at both ends of the floor.”
Hargis tipped his cap to Colonel Crawford.
“They played like a No. 1 seed. They shot very well,” Hargis said. “We tried to take away some stuff and when you do that, you give them other stuff, and they made us pay in every respect.”
Box score
Colonel Crawford 25 25 12 15 — 76
Bucyrus 12 8 8 5 — 33
Stats
Bucyrus (2-21) Shots 13-33; 3-pt. shots 2-11 (Lincoln Blizzard, Carson Witten); Free throws 5-10; Rebounds 16 (Dylan Coppler 5); Turnovers 15. Scoring: Charlie Randall 0 1 1, Lincoln Blizzard 1 0 3, Cohen Chapman 1 2 4, Dylan Coppler 3 1 7, Carson Witten 7 1 16, Oliver Oberlander 1 0 2.
Colonel Crawford (20-2): Shots 32-49; 3-pt. shots 9-15 (Peyton Baker 4, Brayden Holt 2, Parker Weithman, Tyler Lash, Hayden Spears); Free throws 3-6; Rebounds 25 (Brayden Holt 10); Turnovers 4. Scoring: Parker Weithman 6 1 14, Peyton Baker 5 0 14, Evan Metzger 1 0 2, Tyler Lash 2 0 5, John DeGray 5 0 10, Wyatt Spiegel 1 0 2, Brayden Holt 8 2 20, Carter Cramer 2 0 4, Hayden Spears 1 0 3, Payne DeGray 1 0 2.