By ANDREW FEEBACK
When a team holds its opponent to 31 points on 33 percent shooting, keeps it from scoring for an entire quarter, and only sends it to the free throw line twice, the end result is probably favorable much more often than not.
But that was far from the case for the Bluffton boys’ basketball team Friday night as a brutally ineffective offense resulted in a 31-14 loss to the visiting Jay County Patriots.
“Our execution was awful,” coach Craig Teagle said. “We spent four days working on how we were going to attack (the zone). We didn’t put it in those spots very often, we didn’t cut hard enough, didn’t screen well enough, didn’t coach well enough. It’s my job to have us ready to execute against something like that, and we weren’t ready, obviously. That’s on me.”
Axton Beste made a three-pointer for the game’s only points of the first quarter, and his jumper early in the second put the Tigers up 5-0.
Bluffton (6-8) went nearly six minutes until its next points came on a Tucker Jenkins layup. That came after 13 straight from the Patriots (5-9), but the Tigers were still very much in the game, down just six at the break.
The Patriots opened with a triple from Liam Garringer before Jenkins got back to back buckets to bring the Tigers within 16-11.
They entered the fourth quarter down 20-12, but managed only two points the rest of the way, courtesy of a fast-break lay-in from Jenkins following a Patriot turnover near mid-court.
But with only 2:14 to play and the score 27-14, the Patriots were long gone by then.
Jenkins led the Tigers with eight points while Beste had five.
For the Patriots, Gradin Swoveland had 12 while Garringer added seven.
Bluffton finished just 6 of 25 from the field and one of 14 beyond the arc.
Jay County was 13 of 38, but knocked down four more from long range.
As Teagle mentioned, his team’s execution was poor, and the dearth of fast-break opportunities in this game didn’t help.
“We couldn’t find shots against their 1-2-2 zone,” Teagle said. “They struggled to find shots against us for awhile, then (Swoveland) got hot, and that hurt us. We just weren’t very good offensively. We knew going into this game it would be low-scoring; it was going to be which team wins the most possessions. They won more possessions, and we didn’t.”
Bluffton will travel to Madison-Grant tonight.
In the junior varsity game, Nolan Lambert hit a three-pointer at the buzzer to give the Tigers a 38-37 win. He finished with 19 points, while Eli Bertsch had eight and Marshall Gerber had four.
Bluffton also took the freshman game 38-35, with Max White scoring 16 points and Abram Gehrett adding 11.
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JAY COUNTY 31,
BLUFFTON 14
At Bluffton
JAY COUNTY (5-9): Parker Nichols 0-1 0-0 0, Levi Muhlenkamp 2-3 0-0 5, Jackson Edwards 0-0 0-0 0, Carter Fugiett 0-0 0-0 0, Liam Garringer 2-7 2-2 7, Trevin Dunnington 1-8 0-0 3, Ben Crouch 1-2 0-0 2, Eli Dirksen 0-1 0-0 0, Cole Forthofer 0-0 0-0 0, Aiden Phillips 0-0 0-0 0, Wesley Bihn 1-3 0-0 2, Gradin Swoveland 5-12- 0-0 12. TOTALS: 13-38 2-2 31.
BLUFFTON (6-8): Nolan Lambert 0-0 0-0 0, Andrew Hunt 0-4 0-0 0, Elijah Garrett 0-0 0-0 0, Hunter Wenger 0-2 0-0 0, Cameron Williams 0-4 0-0 0, Tucker Jenkins 4-5 0-0 8, Jude Baumgartner 0-0 0-0 0, Axton Beste 2-9 0-0 5, Declan Grieser 0-1 1-2 1, Jared Moser 0-0 0-0 0, Kaleb Green 0-0 0-2 0, Benjamin Maggard 0-0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 6-25 1-4 14.
Jay County 0 13 7 11 — 31
Bluffton 3 4 5 2 — 14
Three-point Goals: Jay County 5-19 (Swoveland 2-6, Dunnington 1-5, Garringer 1-3, Muhlenkamp 1-2, Dirksen 0-1, Nichols 0-1, Crouch 0-1), Bluffton 1-14 (Beste 1-5, Hunt 0-4, Wenger 0-2, Williams 0-3). Rebounds: Jay County 19 (Dunnington 9, Bihn 4, Swoveland 3, Phillips 1, Dirksen 1, Crouch 1), Bluffton 16 (Jenkins 5, Green 3, Grieser 2, Beste 2, Williams 2, Hunt 2). Turnovers: Jay County 10, Bluffton 15. Fouls: Jay County 10, Bluffton 6. Fouled out: None. Technicals: None.
JV: Bluffton 38, Jay County 37.
Freshman: Bluffton 38, Jay County 35.
