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Greenville junior Clay Guillozet knocked in 28 points Saturday against
Versailles. The Wave finished
the regular season on a three game
winning streak. After knocking off Sidney Friday, the Wave edged
Versailles, 62-57. CNO Photos by Dylan Knoop
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Greenville
holds off stubborn Versailles team
Two teams heading in opposite directions
By George Starks
GREENVILLE- It was a night when no lead was safe…especially in the
first half.
Versailles and Greenville met for the second straight year and for the
second straight year, the results were the same.
It was just a year ago when Greenville topped Versailles on a last
second shot in a game played at Versailles.
Saturday, the drama came in a little different form as the Wave (17-4)
downed Versailles (14-6), 62-57.
It was a night when a packed house at Greenville got its money worth
and Wave fans walked away happy while Tiger fans were scratching their
heads wondering what has happened to their team.
“What you have is two really good teams going at it on both sides,”
said Wave coach Mike Bayshore. “You’ve got guys on both sides that can
really put points on the board. What can you say? It was a close game
and we just happened to come out on top. We had some things go our way
at the end and sometimes you have to be more lucky than good and we
were a little bit of both tonight.”
The good for Bayshore and the Wave started to come in the third quarter.
With both teams going hard at it in the opening half. There were four
ties with Versailles holding five leads and Greenville three.
Down 21-17 after one, Greenville and Versailles walked off the court at
the break in the exact same position it started in.
Tied with a 31-31 deadlock.
That’s when Wave junior Clay Guillozet kicked his game into high gear.
With Guillozet being held to only eight points, it was senior Aaron
Balsbaugh that kept the Wave in the game.
At the break, Balsbaugh had scored 16 of the Greenville 31 total points.
“We really felt when Kyle (Ahrens) got his first foul, we really made
it a point to go after him,” said Bayshore. “Because we were trying to
get that second foul, Aaron was getting good looks at the basket. Aaron
does a nice job under the basket for us and being 6-8, we rely on him a
lot when we’re being shut down on the inside. Then in the third
quarter, Clay really stepped it up.”
Guillozet tallied 12 points in the third and the first six for the Wave
in the opening minutes, after Versailles Ahrens knocked down a trey to
get the third frame started.
“He hit three or four big baskets in a row and got us a nice lead,”
commented Bayshore. “That’s what has been great about us all year long.
We’ve got more than one guy that can handle the scoring for us.”
By the end of the quarter, Greenville held a 49-41 lead.
That lead came on the heels of what was the second of two bad calls
against Aherns.
Late in the third quarter, Ahrens was whistled for a foul that he was
never a part of; a foul that should have went against junior Brett
McEldowney.
“The same thing could have happened to us,” said Bayshore. “If we would
have had four on Guillozet, we would have been in the same situation.
We were able to take advantage when he went out and pushed that lead up
because we knew when he came back in, like he did tonight, thing can
change in a hurry.”
“That foul made us change our defense a little,” said Versailles coach
Scott McEldowney. “First, we had to go to zone and put him on somebody
different and try to keep him from getting that fifth foul.”
Changing quickly is exactly what happened as Ahrens, along with his
little brother Justin, started the push.
Down 57-51 with 2:26 remaining, Kyle drained a trey at the 1:05 mark.
After sophomore Isiah Gable hit two shots from the line with 53.7
second remaining, Justin hit a triple and the Tigers trailed 59-57 with
46.8 seconds remaining.
Forced to foul the Wave, Guillozet hit one of two from the line before
senior Cody Preston put the game on ice hitting two more freebies with
10.2 left in the game.
With 17 wins on the season and a huge win over Sidney Friday,
Greenville won the GWOC North title outright.
The 17 wins was a school record while the division title was the first
since 1955.
“There were a lot of goals set at the start of the year and reaching
those goals were huge for us,” admitted Bayshore. “We have more goals
to accomplish and I can’t say how proud I am of my kids and how hard
they work.”
Saturday night, Greenville will look to get its next goal by taking a
first round sectional win over Springboro at Trotwood.
“They are almost a carbon copy of us,” said Bayshore. “They have a
couple of 6-5 kids that they can play in the post and a couple of kids
that average about 14 points. They don’t have kids that average 23 or
24 like we do. I know they will play solid defense and will try to get
physical with us.”
After a disappointing loss to Minster on Friday and a devastating home
loss on senior night to Delphos on the 13th of February, the tigers
looked like a team.
“I thought we played much better tonight,” said McEldowney. “We played
with more energy defensively than what we did last night. Greenville is
a pretty good basketball team and we played much better tonight.”
Now, Versailles will look to its first round sectional at Tecumseh with
National Trail on Tuesday, March 3 with a 7:30 starting time.
A win over the Blazers will send Versailles on to possibly take on
Arcanum at Tipp City on the 7th If the Trojans can get pat the winner
of Anna and Madison to be played on Friday, February 27th.
For all sectional parings and results, go to swdab.org
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Versailles senior Kyle Ahrens hit his season average of 30 but the
Tigers left the regular
season on a skid that saw them losing three of
their last four.
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