Tyler Brewer lays the ball into the basket against Berlin. He finished with 23 points.
Jonathan Bailey photo
The Ripon High School Tiger boys’ basketball team closed the regular season with a 78-71 road loss to the Berlin Indians, but not before pushing the South Central Conference runner-up to the final minute.
Ripon finished 7-7 in conference play and 8-16 overall, while the Indians ended the regular season at 12-2 in the league and 20-4 overall.
“We played hard; we battled hard,” Ripon head coach Andy Bradley said. “A big thing going in was going to be rebounding just because of their size. And for the most part, I thought we rebounded well. … I’m proud of my kids for not giving up and battling hard with the second-best team in our conference. At the end there, [we] had chances to tie it or even take a lead and just came up a little short.”
Berlin jumped out to a 7-2 lead a little more than a minute into the game before the Tigers answered to tie it at 7. The Tigers kept the game within five points the rest of the half, tying the contest three more times. They trailed 33-32 with just over a minute left before heading into the break down 38-34.
Senior Blake Metoxen fueled Berlin’s first-half surge, knocking down four 3-pointers.
“We knew we were going to have a hard time keeping it out of the post, so we were double teaming and then we just kind of lost track [of Metoxen] at times,” Andy Bradley said. “He made some tough shots. We had some closeouts on him, hand in his face and he still hit them. That was our game plan going in was to dig the ball out of the post. And if they were hitting 3-[pointer]s, then you just tip your cap. In that first half, he kind of got hot on us.”
Ripon opened the second half by tying the game at 43 and briefly taking the lead. Sophomore Brett Kastenschmidt scored on a layup to give the Tigers a 45-43 edge and sophomore Blake Bradley added a basket for a 47-45 lead with about 14 minutes left. Those proved to be Ripon’s only two leads.
Tyler Brewer lays the ball into the basket against Berlin. He finished with 23 points.
Berlin responded with back-to-back three-point plays to go ahead 51-47 and did not trail again. The Indians stretched the advantage to 66-58 with five minutes remaining — the largest lead for either team.
“I think a lot of it is just to our depth,” Andy Bradley said. “I think they were getting tired at times. They only played six kids the whole game. And like I said, when we’re constantly going 10 deep, I think they were getting tired, so we just kept pushing the basketball. We were getting some good looks offensively. We were moving the basketball.”
Andy Bradley noted that around the 10-minute mark of the second half, Berlin went zone and that the Tigers struggled at times to knock down shots or even get looks at the basket.
“We had times where we got the ball in the middle and they were sagging off our guy in the middle and then trying to take away our outside shot,” he said. “We had opportunities to score in that zone and we went a little stretch there where we didn’t put the ball in the hoop, so that kind of hurt us a little bit. But overall, offensively, I thought we played very well.”
Ripon continued to battle. Junior Tyler Brewer converted a three-point play and junior Landyn Garrett knocked down a 3-pointer to pull the Tigers within 66-64. With a little more than two minutes remaining, Brewer had a good look at a 3-pointer that would have given Ripon the lead, but it did not fall.
Ripon pulled within a possession again at 72-69 with 43.1 seconds left after Brewer scored five straight points. The Indians, however, sealed the game at the free-throw line.
Brewer finished with 23 points to lead Ripon, while Blake Bradley added 21. Kastenschmidt, making a rare start in part because of Berlin’s size, scored seven points.
“Brett started, which he hasn’t done a whole lot of, and he did a great job,” Andy Bradley said. “For being a sophomore, coming in against a big team like that, he gave us great minutes. Defensively, he played hard. And then offensively, he was looking to attack, which is what we need out of Brett with his size. He had some good finishes, knocked down a 3-[pointer] there in the corner. Brett has been giving us some good minutes and he’s been practicing hard, so we’re going to reward him for that.”
Berlin was led by 33 points from senior forward Hayden Redington and 23 from senior guard Carter Hess, while Metoxen finished with 12.
“They’re big, athletic kids; it’s tough,” Andy Bradley said of trying to stop the 6-foot, 6-inch Redington and 6-foot Hess. “When you’re undersized to begin with, you run things through your head as a coach. Do you go zone? But then at times, it’s even harder to rebound out of a zone. We stuck with our game plan. We went zone for a little bit just because we were in foul trouble very heavily. We did good for the most part, at times when we were in that zone. And then just matched up man again. We were in the ball game and had chances to win it, so it was good to see.”
Despite the loss, Andy Bradley noted the effort could serve the Tigers well heading into Tuesday’s regional quarterfinal home postseason game against Two Rivers, which tips off at 7 p.m.
Ripon is the No. 8 seed, while Two Rivers is the No. 9 seed.
“Just a good game to get us ready for the playoffs because Two Rivers is not super big — they’ve got one big guy — but they’re physical. They’re senior loaded and this game going into that playoff game, got us ready for that. Should be ready to go,” Bradley said. “If we come out with this effort that we exerted against Berlin, I love our chances. It just basically comes down to playing hard. If we play hard, we control the things that we can control, don’t play scared, play aggressive, I think good things will happen and we can come out with a ‘W.’”
The winner of Tuesday’s game will face top-seeded Brillion (21-3 overall) Friday on the road in a regional semifinal game. Tip off is set for 7 p.m.