SYRACUSE - Just when NorthWood's varsity boys basketball team got within striking distance, the Wawasee Warriors put them away.
An 83-70 win over the Panthers Friday at home leaves Wawasee at 5-4 on the season and 1-1 in the Northern Lakes Conference."Any win in the NLC, you have to feel pretty good about," Wawasee coach Phil Mishler said. "Every time, they come to play. It doesn't matter who's down or who's up. Everyone competes in the NLC."
It's been an up-and-down season for both NorthWood (3-5, 0-2 NLC) and Wawasee, but a fourth-quarter scoring surge by the Warriors left the Panthers feeling down Friday.
"We couldn't ever build the lead, and NorthWood stuck with it," Mishler said. "The third quarter really stagnated for us, and slowed things down. NorthWood did a good job of getting where they wanted it. After they started to play catch-up, it sped things up a little bit, and that was in our favor."
In the fourth quarter, NorthWood cut the Wawasee lead to its smallest margin since the end of the first quarter at 59-56.
However, on Wawasee's next possession, junior Cody McBride connected on one of two free throws. McBride's miss came on the second free throw, allowing freshman Jacob Thompson to grab the board and put it back for two points.
The putback helped ignite a 20-5 run over the next three minutes, building a 76-61 lead after a three-point play by junior Riley Stichter with 3:13 to play.
"A free throw rebound kind of breaks your back," NorthWood coach Aaron Wolfe said. "Then, we weren't able to draw the game closer. I think we may have gone into panic mode kind of quickly. Give Wawasee credit, because we weren't able to get the stops when we needed them."
The hardest players for NorthWood to stop were McBride and Stichter, who scored 17 and 16 points, respectively.
The six-foot-5 McBride was making his first start, giving Mishler a different look to his team.
"It's a whole different look when we go from a four-guard front to a three-guard with two bigs inside," Mishler said.
"He sat out all of last year with injuries, but we knew he was a capable player," he added about McBride. "He has good hands, is strong, is tall and he's athletic. It's just a matter of him believing. I think this was great game for him."
McBride connected on all six of his shots, while Stichter was 6 of 8 from field, helping the Warriors hit 71 percent of their two-point shots in the game, 12 of 14 in the second quarter.
Many of those shots came off good entry passes, as Wawasee posted 12 assists in the game, five coming from junior Trevor McKibben.
"They made some tough shots, but there were some times when we had defensive breakdowns," Wolfe said. "In order for us to stay competitive in this conference, we're going to have to fix those."
Along with Stichter and McBride's production, Wawasee got 13 points from senior Keegan Beer, as well 12 from Thompson and another 11 out of McKibben.
NorthWood junior Michael Paul finished with a game-high 20 points on 6-of-17 shooting and senior John Sittler finished the game with 11 rebounds.
Wawasee returns to NLC action Friday at home against Elkhart Memorial.
