By Murray Gleffe
Correspondent
ASHWAUBENON—Brady Wittig hit two free throws with seven seconds left in regulation to lift the Ashwaubenon boys’ basketball team to a 65-63 Fox River Classic Conference victory over Green Bay Southwest Dec. 10 at Ashwaubenon High School.
“I tried to slow down my breathing,” said Wittig about attempting the final free throws. “My dad and I have practiced those game-time situations hundreds of times. Getting the first win under our belt is huge.”
Kyle Krueger led the Jaguars (1-2 overall) with 21 points, and Matt Imig added 17 points.
Ty Melchert had a game-high 31 points in defeat for the Trojans (0-3 overall).
Ashwaubenon jumped out to a quick 18-9 lead after Wittig buried a pair of three-pointers from the top of the key.
It forced Southwest head coach John Polkowski to burn an early timeout.
Each time it looked like the Jaguars were going to pull away in building double-digit leads, the Trojans battled back behind the shooting of Melchert from 22 feet and beyond.
Ashwaubenon took a 38-30 lead into halftime.
The Jags took their largest lead of the night (50-39) after Marcus Tomashek knocked down a floater with 10:25 left in the game.
Southwest continued to fight and scrap, going on a 16-8 run late in the game to cut the lead to 58-55 with 4:13 remaining.
After a costly Ashwaubenon turnover, Melchert came off a screen, gave a jab step to his defender and dropped a 26-footer from the left wing to even the game at 58.
“Melchert is a heck of a player,” said Ashwaubenon head coach Mark Tomashek. “We should have chased him off the three-point line better, but again, it’s a teaching and learning moment for our kids.”
Imig answered on the other end with a triple of his own to give the home team the advantage again.
With the Jaguars clinging to a 63-60 lead with 24 seconds left after Imig connected on two free throws, Melchert was at it again.
He hit a step-back three from the corner without stepping out of bounds and hit nothing but net to deadlock the contest at 63 all with nine seconds to go.
As Wittig was coming to get the ball to set up the last possession for the Jaguars, he was inexplicably fouled.
After calmly nailing both free throws to give Ashwaubenon a two-point advantage, the Trojans threw the ball away on their final possession.
“It’s big for our kids to get this win,” said Tomashek. “They worked for it. When we get the chance, we have to try and close out these one and two-point games. We continue to preach to be tough and strong and good things will happen.”
Box score
Green Bay Southwest: 30, 33—63
Ashwaubenon: 38, 27—65
Trojans: Melchert 31, Baade 11, Pytleski 9, Danforth 6, Burg 6
Jaguars: Krueger 21, Imig 17, Tomashek 13, Wittig 8, Spika 3, Zollar 3