Fort falters in sectional final

ST. MARYS, Ohio — The Indians turned their one-point lead at the half into a nine-point cushion less than three minutes into the second.

In the matter of three possessions it was down to zero.

And after going trailing by one to start the fourth, the Tribe went up by three midway through the fourth.

An Alex Eyink bucket and the final triple from Bryce Moeller put the Flyers out front for good.

Fort Recovery High School’s boys basketball team squandered two second-half leads and had a potential go-ahead basket with two seconds left miss the mark in a 32-30 loss to the Marion Local Flyers in the Division IV sectional final on Friday at Memorial High School.

“It hurt, a lot,” said Grant Knapke, one of two Indian seniors who had their careers come to a close and the one who took the potential winning 3-pointer from the left corner. “As a senior that was my last ever game played in a Fort Recovery jersey, and for me to have a chance to hit a winning shot with two seconds left and miss, it killed me.”

Marion Local, the district’s No. 9 seed which lost to Fort Recovery 44-32 during the regular season matchup Jan. 31, advances to the district semifinal at 6:15 p.m. Tuesday at Wapakoneta against New Bremen, which beat St. Henry 54-45 in the other sectional final Friday night.

Top-seeded Fort Recovery ends its year 16-7.

“We had to make it an ugly game,” said Marion Local coach Kurt Goettemoeller, whose Flyers have now won seven in a row and move to 12-12.

“We’re just not a thing of beauty on offense, so we just had to find a way to get stops against them.”

Goettemoeller gave credit to assistant coach Chad Cramer for the defensive game plan.

Leading 17-16 after intermission, Fort Recovery built the biggest lead by either team thanks to an 8-0 run to start the second half. Brian Bihn scored five points, including three the hard way, and Knapke scored his only points of the game, a triple from the right wing on an inbound play.

Bihn’s final basket in the run, on a Knapke assist, made it 25-16 and forced Goettemoeller into calling a timeout.

“We’re in trouble because we’re not a quick-strike offense,” Goettemoeller said of his thoughts at that moment.

Charlie Huelsman stopped the bleeding with a transition 3-pointer from the top of the key. Then after an Indian miss, Eyink buried one from deep to cut the deficit to three and force FRHS coach Jim Melton into calling a timeout.

“Coach was just really frustrated with our transition defense,” Knapke said. Melton could not be reached for comment. “If I’m thinking correctly, they got some wide open threes that cut our lead down.”

The Indians missed on their ensuing possession, and Eyink again hit from long range to tie the game before laying one in to cap an 11-0 Flyer run.

“That was just obviously a key point in the game for us to get back,” Goettemoeller said. “The rest of the way there it was a dogfight.”

Down 27-26 to start the fourth quarter, Derek Jutte made both ends of a one-and-one to give the Indians the lead, and following a Flyer missed 3-pointer — they were 7-of-19 from behind the arc — the Indians killed 2:30 off the clock before Jutte put the Tribe on top 30-27.

An Eyink bucket and Moeller’s fourth 3-pointer gave Marion Local a 32-30 advantage with 2:44 to play and the Indians never scored again, including two missed shots from inside 10 feet, a free-throw violation on the front end of a one-and-one as well as Knapke’s missed 3-pointer from the corner.

“They hit shots tonight,” Knapke said. “In the regular season game they were nowhere near that amount of threes made. They also did a good job of stopping our set plays.”