St. Vincent boys basketball team holds off Oak Ridge in final minute

OAK RIDGE -- The St. Vincent boys basketball team faced a task it had not yet confronted this season against Oak Ridge on Monday night.

After building up a 10-point lead early in the second half, the Indians watched that slip to just three points with 10 seconds to play.

"It was just a lack of playing a close ball game," St. Vincent coach Bruce Valleroy said about allowing the Blue Jays to get back in the game. "We haven't had a close ball game all year. Leopold was about an eight-point game, but other than that we really haven't had anything close to recognize what we need to do. And I think we kind of freaked out a little bit there at the end."

Following an Oak Ridge 3-pointer by sophomore Steven Masterson and a timeout, St. Vincent's Tyler Monier was fouled and sent to the line to shoot one-and-one and possibly seal the game for the Indians.

But the sophomore missed, giving the Blue Jays one final chance to force overtime.

Senior Joe Grieme grabbed the rebound and dribbled for a few steps before throwing up a potential game-tying 3.

However, Grieme's shot fell short of the rim, securing a 46-43 victory for St. Vincent.

"We couldn't hit a free throw if our life depended on it in those final seconds, but we played good enough to pull it out," Valleroy said. "They were out of timeouts, so we did not want to let them shoot a 3. If they wanted to go in and get a layup, fine. It was going to take us more than five seconds to get the ball out and we would win the ball game. So we were going to switch to just all screens and just not let them get a 3-pointer off.

"Well, lo and behold, we try to sneak behind a guy to steal the ball instead of doing our assignments and they got a good shot and just missed it. Thank God he did or we could still be playing. It just comes down to the fundamentals of the game and listening. When we do the fundamentals and we listen, we'll be OK, but it's still a good win for us. I'm proud of the win and proud of the effort that these guys put out there tonight."

Oak Ridge coach Adam Stoneking said his players looked out of sorts in the second half.

A breakdown in shot selection as well as miscommunication, which caused turnovers, led to Oak Ridge (1-9) having to play from behind, something that has become a common occurrence for the Blue Jays this season, according to Stoneking.

"We would come down and just take rushed shots where we had nobody in position to rebound, or slow them down off a rebound," Stoneking said. "They were able to just kind of get it and go because we were out of position and basically just handing them the ball. I just thought we were really flat defensively and offensively."

The two teams played to an 8-8 tie after the opening period.

St. Vincent (4-9) had an 8-4 lead, but let Oak Ridge finish out the first with a 4-0 run.

The Indians opened an 18-14 lead with 4 minutes, 14 seconds to play in the half, with St. Vincent junior Jordan Buchheit scoring four points during that span. But the Indians were held scoreless for the remainder of the quarter.

The Indians turned the ball over four times in the final four minutes of the second, and were limited to just four shots as Oak Ridge closed with a 7-0 run for a 21-18 at halftime.

Valleroy said he was not happy with the way the Indians finished the first half, and let them know it in the locker room.

"I thought we played real well until about the last four minutes of the second quarter, and then we just stopped playing," Valleroy said. "We were on 18 forever. I though our trap was successful there early in the ball game, but as the second quarter went along, we just didn't get after it like we had been. And basically that was the message at halftime. I said, 'Guys, we've got to get after it. If we're going to be successful, we've got to play 32 minutes solid minutes of basketball, and we just let four minutes slip away there.'"

The Indians heeded their coach's advice and came out of the break with a 17-4 run, opening a 35-25 lead over Oak Ridge with 2:04 remaining in the third.

Buchheit and sophomore Luke Wibbenmeyer each tallied five points for St. Vincent during that stretch.

The Indians also made their only two 3's of the game in the third. Monier started St. Vincent's run with a trey at 6:41, while Buchheit's came two minutes later to give them a 31-23 lead.

"Just overall getting after it made us a better team there. When you get after it, good things are going to happen to you," Valleroy said about St. Vincent's shooting performance in the third. "I think we saw the floor a little better, we hustled up and down the floor and put the ball in the basket. I think we got the same shots the first half as we did in the second half. We didn't put them in the first half, but we did actually put them in [in] the second half. I think we shot a pretty good percentage in the second half."

St. Vincent shot 63 percent (12 of 19) over the final two quarters and outscored Oak Ridge 28-22.

But Oak Ridge didn't go down without a fight.

The Blue Jays closed out the third on a 7-3 run to pull within 38-32, and they would stay within about six points much of the fourth.

Oak Ridge trailed 46-40 with 1:44 remaining after Grieme drove for a layup.

After a St. Vincent timeout, Buchheit was fouled and went to the line to shoot one-and-one.

Buchheit missed the front end and the rebound was scooped up by sophomore Kyle Keller, who dribbled down the court and tried a jumper from the top of the key with 16 seconds to go. His shot hit the front end of the rim and bounced back into his own hands before the Blue Jays used their final timeout.

Oak Ridge drew up a play to get Masterson the ball for a 3, and the strategy worked. However, it was as close as they would get.

"When you're winning, you tell your guys not to look at your record. You take it one game at a time. And if you aren't winning games you tell your guys the same thing," Stoneking said. "We've tried to break this season up into three seasons. This was only our second game to the start of our second season, so we just work to get better before the conference tournament. I think we made some gains tonight, and that's something you can be happy about."

Nathan Bolin finished with 13 points to lead Oak Ridge, while Keller had nine.

Trevor Lieble led St. Vincent with 10 points and Joe Whistler and Buchheit each had nine points.

Valleroy said the Indians will have to rely on a team effort and share the ball to have success for the remainder of the season.

"We hope that we gain some momentum from this one. We're a young team," Valleroy said. "We only have one senior and four juniors with experience. Hopefully we'll learn from this, gain some momentum and start being competitive. We haven't played bad against teams, but we do allow them to go on runs. It comes down to being able to deny those runs."

St. Vincent 8 10 20 8 -- 46

Oak Ridge 8 13 11 11 -- 43

ST. VINCENT (46) -- Trevor Lieble 10, Joe Whistler 9, Jordan Buchheit 9, Luke Wibbenmeyer 8, Kaleb Schurbusch 5, Tyler Monier 5. FG 20, FT 3-7, F 14 (3-pointers: Schnurbusch 1, Buchheit 1, Monier 1. Fouled out: none.)

OAK RIDGE (43) -- Nathan Bolin 13, Kyle Keller 9, Clay Maintz 6, Steven Masterson 6, Joe Grieme 5, Jacob Seabaugh 4. FG 17, FT 4-13, F 14. (3-pointers: Masterson 2, Bolin 1. Fouled out: Bolin.)