By RYAN WALKER
PONETO — For at least one half, it looked like Southern Wells was going to have to scratch and claw its way for a victory, but a 35-10 second half put that to rest quickly.
In one of their most impressive quarters of the season, the Raiders’ (5-10) third quarter explosion lifted them to three-straight wins in a 50-30 final score over Lakeland Christian (1-13).
The first half was the exact opposite for the home team, shooting a less-than-stellar 6-20 from the floor and only 15 points by halftime. Cougars 6”4’ big man Micah Martin splashed all three of his triples and produced 16 of his team’s 20-15 edge at the half.
The Raiders took the halftime speech and adjustments from their coaching staff to switch from zone to man-to-man and get a body on Martin at all times. They got help in the paint as he struggled to find any space, and got his pocket picked multiple times in the third quarter.
Turnovers turned to transition points, and Chandler Oswalt picked up his own trio of threes in the quarter that aided the 26-point quarter. That was the most since its 29-point third quarter in a win over Randolph Southern in the Union City Holiday Tournament in December.
“I think it was a mindset,” Southern Wells head coach Joel Roush said of the second-half adjustments. “We’ve been playing quite a bit of a zone because we needed to against the teams we’ve been playing. We switched back to (man-to-man) in the second half and were able to turn them over and get some easy baskets, and the basket gets better when you see some shots go through, and that was really important.”
The sudden surge of offense began with CJ Reber’s bucket right away out of the locker room. Then Perrin Gates grabbed an offensive board to put back for two that set up Oswalt and Evan Pennington’s back-to-back threes.
The 10-0 run forced an early timeout by Lakeland Christian head coach Taylor Long not even three minutes into the half to make it 25-22 Raiders, but there was more.
Gates and Oswalt traded baskets after the timeout and kept the crowd alive.
After scoring 23 points, Oswalt sunk a three near the far corner at half-court as the horn sounded to put the cherry on top. The Raider Dome went bonkers.
“It boosts the energy. The crowd gets excited,” Roush said. “The kids get excited, and in the overall scheme of things, it’s three points, but for us, three points are important. It doesn’t matter where they come from. I’m not going to lie; as soon as he shot it, I said, ‘He made that.’ It just looked good the whole way.”
The defense also showed out in the second half, not allowing Martin any space, and went 1-6 with no free throws in the final two periods. The Cougars scored only 10 points to Southern Wells’ 35.
This third win in a row for the Raiders hasn’t come easy by any means. The team ground out a win over South Adams the night prior on the road. The first victory of the streak over Muncie Burris was a 5-point game in the second half before pulling away 58-42.
Roush has been pleased during the stretch with his team’s ability to find a way to win the game and gut them out.
“I think it’s just our grit,” Roush said. “We had every chance to fold against South Adams and didn’t. We had every chance to fold against Burris and didn’t. And we could have held our heads at halftime and say,’ Oh, here we go again,’ and we didn’t. We gritted our teeth and were able to have some success, and that’s really a feather in the cap of our guys.”
Oswalt led the team with 19 points, three ahead of Marin. Pennington finished with nine, Gates eight and Reber seven.
Southern Wells will play next at Jay County for a 7:30 tipoff on Thursday, Feb. 1.
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SOUTHERN WELLS 50,
LAKELAND CHRISTIAN 30
At Southern Wells
LAKELAND CHRISTIAN (1-13): Micah Martin 5-11 5-6 18, Josiah Rice 5-12 2-6 12, Aaron Gause 0-3 0-0 0, Jaden Moneyheffer 0-1 0-0 0, Zaiden Miller 0-1 0-0 0, Ethan Gaff 0-0 0-0 0, Isaiah Stahl 0-1 0-0 0, Kolton Shepard 0-1 0-0 0. TOTALS: 10-29 8-13 30.
SOUTHERN WELLS (5-10): Chandler Oswalt 7-17 0-0 19, Evan Pennington 4-6 0-0 9, Perrin Gates 3-4 2-2 8, CJ Reber 3-7 0-0 7, Caleb Johnson 1-3 0-0 3, Joshua Aulbach 1-2 0-0 2, Landon Johnson 1-3 0-0 2, Andrew Aker 0-4 0-0 0, Trey Slusher 0-0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 20-46 2-2 50.
L. Christian 8 12 5 5 — 30
S. Wells 8 7 26 9 — 50
Three-Point Field Goals: Lakeland Christian: 3-6 (Martin 3-5 Gause 0-1), Southern Wells: 8-22 (Oswalt 5-12, C. Johnson 1-2, Pennington 1-1, Reber 1-3, Aker 0-3, L. Johnson 0-1). Rebounds: Lakeland Christian: 20 (Rice 7, Martin 5, Gaff 3, Gause 3, Stahl 1, Moneyheffer 1), Southern Wells: 20 (Reber 6, Gates 6, Pennington 3, Aker 2, Oswalt 1, L. Johnson 1, C. Johnson 1). Turnovers: Lakeland Christian: 11, Southern Wells: 3. Fouls: Lakeland Christian: 4, Southern Wells: 15. Fouled Out: Southern Wells: Gates. Technical Fouls: None.
