BUENA VISTA-Other than a whistle, there's one sound on a basketball court wholly unlike any other.
And the unfortunate soul who sounded his, with 7:04 left in last Saturday's third quarter, should have known what he'd actually heard, because he also heard it the last time a Buena Vista player tried putting up a shot against Bayfield's Ryan Phelps: THUD!
Hand wallops ball, ball goes in completely different direction than initially intended.
Phelps had already violently rejected a Demon's attempt off the backboard on Day 2 of the 2015 BVHS Invitational when his next chance materialized. Leaping within his target's visual blind spot to the rear, the Wolverine sophomore spiked the enemy's shot down vertically, with nearly a foot of space separating their bodies.
There was no doubting what had happened, but.. PHREEEEEET!
A foul called against Phelps, and normally composed Head Coach Jeff Lehnus couldn't avoid a verbal breakdown.
"Got in a little foul trouble, and I wasn't happy about a thing or two," he said of his technical foul afterwards, putting some wry humor into the snowy walk back to the team bus.
Many Bayfield fans would have used more colorful language, but luckily Lehnus took the only fall for his man's misfortune and BVHS, inexplicably, failed to fully capitalize on the foul.
Senior Lukas Ommen and sophomore Cade Carroll each hit only one of two free throws, and after having lost a sizeable lead during the second quarter, a Zane Phelps FT soon brought the Wolverines back to 38-37 and a Fred Edwards putback of a Hunter Killough miss had the visitors again ahead (41-39) entering the tell-all fourth quarter.
Killough canned a 16-footer, and senior Taed Heydinger swooped to the basket for consecutive layups and a 47-39 lead-forcing Buena Vista Coach Scott Crites into using a timeout. This was reminiscent of the game's exciting first-quarter, highlighted by freshman Keyon Prior's slick up-and-under layup and senior Zach Kujath's deft feed inside to Edwards for a stanza-sealing layup and threatening 19-13 advantage.
But beginning with senior Keenan Barr's layup with 5:52 remaining in the teams' weekend, the Demons went on a 12-4 run to pull even, 51-51, with senior Tanner Latkovich's deep three-pointer.
"Was way out there too," Lehnus said. "I don't know what possessed him-three minutes to go, you shoot that kind of shot.that's gutsy! They hit some big shots, so give them some credit. There were a couple."
Ommen capped his 16-point outing with a three-point play for a 57-53 lead.
Heydinger raised the guests' hopes with a late triple, giving the guard a game-best 17, but when Ryan Phelps was given his disqualifying fifth personal with only 17 seconds left, Barr sank two of his clinching four consecutive FT's-making him an impressive 10-of-11 at the line and the Demons 23-of-30 as a whole.
Bayfield went 16-of-20, led by 5-of-6 shooting by Heydinger and Zane Phelps, who totaled 13 points. Edwards was excellent off the bench and booked 10 points, while Prior and Ryan Phelps each finished with six.
"We saw improvements.just were not able to close it tonight," said Lehnus after the 65-56 defeat. "But compared to where we've been, there was progress."
Earlier in the tournament, they tried to keep up with Lafayette Peak to Peak in a 71-56 loss on Day 1. Raising eyebrows with their inside ability however, the Wolverines effectively contained the potent pair of 6'11" junior Brayden Weyer (8 points) and 6'6" senior Peter Starbuck (4) before falling prey to the Pumas' guards. Ryan Phelps scored nine points, and Edwards and Brian Mashak each had seven.
Up next, BHS (1-3, 0-0 3A Intermountain) hosts 2A Blanding, Utah, San Juan tonight at 6:30 p.m. The Broncos enter BHS Gymnasium 3-2 overall after downing 4A Fabens, Texas in the seventh-place game of last weekend's Marv Sanders Invitational in Farmington.
AT THE 2015 BVHS INVITATIONAL, DAY 2-Bayfield (19-9-13-15) 56: T.Heydinger 5 5-6 17, Z.Phelps 4 5-6 13, K.Prior 2 2-2 6, H.Killough 1 0-0 2, R.Phelps 3 0-0 6, B.Mashak 0 0-1 0, Z.Kujath 0 0-0 0, F.Edwards 4 2-2 10, H.Farmer 0 2-3 2, B.Stuever 0 0-0 0, D.Snooks 0 0-0 0, C.Heide 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 19 16-20 56. 3-POINTERS: Heydinger 2. FOULED OUT: R.Phelps (0:17 left, Q4).
Buena Vista (13-18-8-26) 65: T.Latkovich 1 0-0 3, K.Barr 2 10-11 15, Jos.Yates 3 0-0 9, C.Carroll 2 7-10 11, L.Ommen 5 5-7 16, C.Walters 0 0-0 0, C.Eggleston 3 1-2 9, B.Schumann 1 0-0 2, Jor.Yates 0 0-0 0, D.Tanner 0 0-0 0, C.Blankenbeckler 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 17 23-30 65. 3-POINTERS: Jos.Yates 3, Eggleston 2, Ommen, Barr, Latkovich. FOULED OUT: None.
