SYRACUSE – The Wawasee boys basketball team never trailed in its 92-48 home win over the Manchester Squires Friday night, but things didn't always looking good either. Implementing its uptempo offense and full-court press against the Squires (0-3), the Warriors (3-0) built a 42-20 halftime lead despite shooting just 36 percent, 12 of 31 from inside the lane. "We were missing a lot of layups," Wawasee coach Phil Mishler said. "Manchester was doing a good job of getting a body on us as we were going up. We had a hard time adjusting. I thought it was a nice test, early, for us with that physical play." Those missed shots did help Wawasee outrebound Manchester 49-28 over the course of the game, with 25 of those being offensive boards. "It takes a combination of things to get offensive rebounds — you have to miss shots," Mishler said. "In a sense, it's a nice stat, but at the same time, that means we're missing some shots." Entering the game at 0-2, first-year Manchester coach Eric Thompson knew his team was in for a battle, but was able to take some positives out of the 34-point loss. "Coach Mishler's a great coach with a great system," he said. "We knew it'd be tough coming in, especially with us coming in with a new system. We tried to get the kids ready, but it was a buzz saw. "It was good for us from a learning experience," he added. "The kids are working. It's not fun to get beat that badly, but it's fun to see the growth. The kids aren't down. We're just going to look to get better with the next game." One of the blades in the buzz saw was Wawasee junior Jacob Thompson, who made 6 of 7 shots in the third quarter, scoring 15 of his game-high 35 points in the quarter. Along with hitting 14 of his 24 shots, Jacob Thompson also had six steals, many of which lead to easy layups. "You could tell he was feeling it," Mishler said of the 6-foot-5 guard. "He was working hard defensively too. His defense probably created 15 of those 35 points he had." Along with Jacob Thompson's production, Wawasee senior Jake Clark had 19 points, six rebounds, three assists and three steals, while senior point guard Trent Koble had 11 points, four steals and a game-high 12 rebounds. "In our system, he has the ability to kind of really crash from the weak side," Mishler said about Koble, the smallest player on the team at 5-9. "When you're taking a lot of 3s and long shots, it opens that up. He's got some nice athletic ability and he anticipates where the ball is going to go pretty well." Manchester was led by sophomore Clayton Petrie's nine points, while junior Neil Underwood had eight and seniors Derek Self and Connor McLaughlin each had seven. "The speed and caliber of play that Wawasee was at was way too fast for us, in all areas," the Eric Thompson said of his team, which committed 25 turnovers. "You can tell those kids put the time in during the summer. That helped to show our kids that's what we need to do if we want to get to that level." And Eric Thompson knows that level well, coming from a Peru team that was 53-14 over the past three seasons, winning one sectional title and reaching No. 1 in the Class 3A rankings a season ago. "I knew it'd be tough," Thompson said about coming to Manchester. "I had forgotten how tough, but it's fun. Peru was in this situation 10 years ago. While I was there, it was nose to the grindstone and build it up in order to get some accolades. That's our goal again." Wawasee is right back in action tonight at West Noble, while Manchester's next contest isn't until Dec. 13 when the Squires travel to Churubusco.
WAWASEE 92, MANCHESTER 48 M 8 12 15 13 – 48 W 19 22 32 19 – 92 Wawasee – Trent Koble 4-8 1-2 11, Jacob Thompson 14-24 4-8 35, Jake Clark 7-9 4-7 19, Zac Patrick 1-8 2-2 4, Justin Fick 1-3 0-0 2, Austin Lutz 1-1 0-0 2, Douglas Hapner 0-0 0-0 0, Chase Myers 2-3 2-2 8, Jacob Blackburn 0-0 0-0 0, Ryndan Aaron 1-6 2-3 4, Alex Clark 1-4 0-0 2, Garrett Balser 0-0 0-0 0, Bauer Schmeltz 2-5 0-2 5, Kody Carpenter 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 34-71 15-26 92. Manchester – Claudel Dickantone 1-2 0-0 2, Connor McLaughlin 3-7 0-0 7, Caleb Thomas 1-7 0-0 2, Logan Brunn 2-7 1-2 5, Neil Underwood 3-14 0-0 8, Derek Self 3-6 0-0 7, Micah McDaniel 0-1 0-0 0, Grant Schuler 0-0 0-0 0, Clayton Petrie 3-4 2-2 9, Phoenix Goad 1-1 0-0 2, Noah Johnson 3-4 0-0 6. Totals 20-53 3-4 48. Three-point goals – Wawasee 9-24 (Thompson 3, Koble 2, Myers 2, J. Clark, Schmeltz), Manchester 5-11 (Underwood 2, Self, McLaughlin, Petrie); Team Fouls (fouled out) – Wawasee 13, Manchester 24 (Self); Turnovers – Wawasee 9, Manchester 25; Rebounds – Wawasee 49 (Koble 12), Manchester 28 (Brunn 4); Assists – Wawasee 13 (J. Clark 3, Patrick 3), Manchester 2; Steals – Wawasee 18 (Thompson 6), Manchester 6; Blocks – Wawasee 2 (Fick 2), Manchester 0; Records: Wawasee 3-0, Manchester 0-3 JV – Wawasee 46, Manchester 37 Wawasee – Myers 17, A. Clark 9, Blackburn 7, Lutz 5, Balser 4, Hapner 3, Aaron Vorol 1 Manchester – Lennart Simon 18, Cody Hann 6, Petrie 5, Johnson 4, Micah McDaniel 4
