Calvert edges St. Paul in OT

NORWALK — Another night, another chance. The St. Paul boys basketball team did just about everything it needed to do to beat a quality non-league opponent Wednesday night. But the Flyers came up a basket short in several key junctures and came up on the wrong side of a 45-41 loss in overtime to Tiffin Calvert in a non-league game inside Harvey Keller Gymnasium. The Flyers fell to 7-8 with the loss that saw them shoot 14-of-46 from the floor with 11 turnovers. "Defensively you like your chances going into overtime tied at 36, but offensively you obviously don't like how it's going," St. Paul head coach Steve Minor said. "We're dealing with the sickness and injuries like everyone does this time of the year. That's just part of it, and we have to push through. "We were back in that 'almost' mode tonight. We were almost good enough to beat a good team. We're finding different ways to be almost good enough, but credit Calvert for hitting some shots when they needed them." St. Paul took a 32-30 lead with 5:24 left in the game when Nate Griffin was fouled on a three-pointer and converted all three free throws. Isaac Kalizewski split two foul shots to push the lead out to 33-30 with 4:17 remaining, but back came the Senecas (8-4). Vincenzo Lyons scored, then a steal and layup by Logan Ritzler with 2:52 remaining gave Calvert the lead back at 34-33. Freshman Casey Fries answered with a big 3-pointer for the Flyers with 2:10 remaining, only for Max Herbert to tie the game up at 36 just 20 seconds later. The Flyers then tried running down the clock to set up for a final shot but ultimately turned it over on an errant pass with 19.1 seconds remaining. Calvert then saw a last-second shot by Ritzler from close range come up short, sending the game to overtime. Ritzler quickly scored to start the OT, but Landon Fries made a 3 at the other end to give the Flyers a 39-38 lead with 2:50 remaining. Logan DeMoss gave the Senecas the lead right back just 17 seconds later, however. After a St. Paul turnover, Grady Otterbacher was fouled and made both free throws for a 42-39 lead. It appeared the Flyers were in trouble when DeMoss split a pair with 1:21 left for a 43-39 lead. However, Landon Fries scored with 50 seconds left, and then the Senecas committed their 17th turnover of the game with 32.2 seconds left. Out of a timeout, Minor opted for the Flyers to go for the win, and a 3 by Landon Fries from the top of the key just rimmed out. Otterbacher grabbed the rebound with four seconds left, was fouled, and made both free throws for the final margin. "We got lucky to escape with the win," Calvert head coach Jon Otterbacher said. "St. Paul is a good team, but they're not deep, and we wanted to run more and didn't do a good job of that. "I thought they shot an average clip, but they killed us on second-chance and loose 50/50 balls tonight." Minor was complimentary of Coach Otterbacher and the Senecas. "They are always so well-coached, and they make it hard on you to run your sets," he said. "Our guys have to understand and recognize when that happens; just play. I have to do a better job of getting them to just play basketball when a team takes them out of their routines or sets." Ritzler came out with the hot hand in the first half for the Senecas. He made consecutive 3-pointers, one from Landon Fries for the Flyers, and then Herbert scored to put Calvert up 8-3 barely two minutes into the contest. St. Paul then strung together seven straight points to take a brief 10-8 lead at the 2:20 mark. Kalizewski started and finished the run with a rebound putback from close range. Ritzler then gave the Senecas the lead right back with his third 3 of the quarter as they held a 13-11 lead after one quarter. The start of the second quarter then belonged to Calvert's Lyons. He scored the first six points of the quarter to push the Calvert lead to 19-13 with 5:21 left in the half. The Flyers came back when Brady Fritz made a 3 from the top of the key off a rebound deflection, then Fries scored inside after a Calvert turnover to make it 19-18 with 2:48 left in the half. Lyons again scored for the Senecas as he raced baskets with Fries. Off a St. Paul turnover, Herbert closed the first-half scoring with 1:21 left to give Calvert a 23-20 lead. The third quarter was a struggle for both teams. The Flyers held a 7-5 scoring edge in the eight minutes as both teams combined to shoot 4 of 16 from the floor. Landon Fries finished with 15 points for St. Paul, while Fritz added eight points. Kalizewski had five points and seven rebounds. The Flyers (2-5 FC) visit South Central (6-7, 2-6) in a Firelands Conference game on Friday. Minor said the loss didn't come without positives. Monroeville averaged 58.3 points per game before the Flyers held them to 38 in a 41-38 win on Jan. 17. The Senecas entered Wednesday averaging 62.3 points and were held to 36 through regulation. "We're not happy with a loss, but we are going to find a lot of positives and good things to take away from this," he said. "Our defense was very good again. "We're just going to focus on one game at a time until the end of the year. No game is out of reach the rest of the way. We just need to polish some things and finish strong and get ready for our draw." TIFFIN CALVERT (8-4) Grady Otterbacher 2-4—8; Logan Ritzler 5-1—14; Max Herber 4-0—8; Logan DeMoss 2-1—5; Vincenzo Lyons 5-0—10. TOTALS 18-6—45. ST. PAUL (7-8) Nate Griffin 0-6—6; Casey Fries 1-0—3; Connor Lindenberger 2-0—4; Isaac Kalizewski 2-1—5; Brady Fritz 3-0—8; Landon Fries 6-0—15. TOTALS 14-7—41. Calvert 11 12 5 8 9 — 45 St. Paul 13 7 7 9 5 — 41 3-point FGs: (TC) Ritzler 3; (SP) L. Fries 3, Fritz 2, C. Fries.