Patriots win opener

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The Tigers weren’t able to get into their offense early.

They couldn’t stop Michael Schlechty in the second half.

Jay County High School’s boys basketball team forced Hagerstown into shooting poorly and Schlechty had a career effort in the second half as the Patriots won their season and home opener on Tuesday, 49-41.

“I thought defensive wise were were phenomenal,” said JCHS coach Chris Krieg, whose team returns to action on Saturday as it hosts the Richmond Red Devils. “We really took them out of everything they threw at us.”

Although Hagerstown (0-1), which defeated Jay County 51-44 last season in the first meeting between the two schools, hit a 3-pointer to take a 22-21 lead with two minutes to play third quarter, the Patriots’ limited the visitors’ chances over the next five minutes to re-take the lead.

Wyatt Geesaman split a pair of free throws to tie the score, and Ryan Schlechty spun around a defender at the 3-point line and drove the lane for a layup. The next time down the court, Geesaman dished a pass to Parker Grimes for an easy lay up. Hagerstown, meanwhile, missed 3-point attempts — it was 7-of-24 from distance for the game — on consecutive possessions, and missed the mark twice more from the field during the stretch.

To start the fourth, Jay County scored five straight — a free throw from Geesaman and a basket with two foul shots by Michael Schlechty — to cap a 10-0 spurt and make it 31-22 Jay County.

“Right place, right time,” Krieg said of Schlechty’s effort after intermission.

Schlechty, who did not attempt a shot in the first half, scored all of his game- and career-high 17 points in the final 16 minutes.

“I didn’t think there was much more difference (between halves),” he said. “I got more open shots in the second half. We had a really good effort. Moved the ball pretty well, opened up holes and got me open.”

He had 13 points in the fourth quarter alone, including sinking all seven of his free-throw attempts.

“Something I did in the offseason was really work on my free throws because I wasn’t the best finisher last year,” he added. “That is something I wanted to improve about my game.”

His teammates excelled down the stretch from the charity stripe too, as the Patriots were 13-of-16 in the final eight minutes. Holton Hill, who tied Geesaman for second on the team with seven points, made three shots from the foul line, while Geesaman hit a pair and Ryan Schlechty had one.

“Hit free throws, that’s what you’ve got to do to win ball games,” Krieg said.

It was quite a slow start for both teams to begin the season.

Trent Weiss drained a 3-pointer on the game’s first possession before Jay County rattled off four straight points on a jumper from the free throw line by Max Moser and two Hill free throws.

But for nearly three minutes, the score remained 4-3 in favor of Jay County, which led 9-7 after the first quarter.

The score stayed 9-7 for more than four minutes of the second quarter, until Stigleman put back his own miss with 3:37 left in the half.

“First half I thought defensive wise we were phenomenal,” Krieg said.

Both teams shot poorly during the first two quarters as they combined to go 9-of-36 from the field.

Weiss led Hagerstown with 16 points, including making four of his 10 shots from behind the 3-point line.



Junior varsity

Jay County held off a fourth-quarter surge to beat Hagerstown 38-33.

The Patriots (1-0) had a 27-17 lead after three quarters of play and struggled to keep the Tigers at bay. The visitors held a 16-11 edge in the final seven minutes, but the deficit from the first three periods was too much to overcome.

Xavier Ninde scored 11 points for the Patriots, who had a 10-3 lead after the first quarter and took a 21-12 lead into intermission.

Gabe Link was second on the team with nine points, while Matthew Franks and Gavin Randall contributed seven and four points respectively.

Branton Payne led Hagerstown with 11 points.