Hot start flies Hawks past GB East

Just three days after a 32-point loss to Xavier, the Shawano Community High School boys basketball team came out firing Friday night.

The Hawks made seven first-half 3-pointers to take a 35-19 advantage and piled it on in the second half for a 75-52 home victory over Green Bay East in a Bay Conference matchup.

“That loss against Xavier hit us the wrong way, and we came out with fire like we’ve got to get something back,” Shawano sophomore Kaden Richards said. “(Green Bay East) has been very good. They’ve been hot, so we made sure we came in here and played good.”

With Shawano already holding a 6-4 lead just over five minutes into the contest, senior Adam Bartz got past his defender and drove down the lane on two consecutive possessions before dishing the ball both times to Richards, who knocked in 3-pointers from the wing to push the lead to 12-4.

“Any time we can get (Adam Bartz) open and going to the bucket, we’re going to have some good success,” Shawano head coach Dave Ambrosius said. “So I just think that was evident tonight, coming off that top of the key, he was tough for them to keep control, and that made everybody else have to help.”

A little less than one minute later, Richards drove across the lane and got fouled for a 3-point play before junior Austin Kohl hit a layup and a baseline jumper on consecutive possessions for a 19-7 lead.

Sophomore Cole Nelson hit a 3 with 6:38 remaining in the half before the game slowed down, but Kohl, Nelson and Richards added triples to put the Hawks up by 18 in the first half.

“It was definitely a team victory. Everybody was stepping up and hitting shots. We had really good ball movement, and we were making the extra pass,” Ambrosius said. “Every time you make the extra pass, you’re going to get a wide-open shot, so it was nice to see our kids step up and shoot them with confidence.”

Green Bay East (7-9, 6-3 Bay) had won consecutive games coming into Friday’s contest, including a 2-point victory over West De Pere.

Once Shawano (6-9, 5-4 Bay) jumped out to the early lead, the Red Devils could not attack the Hawks’ 2-3 zone and man-to-man defense enough for easy points.

Green Bay East did succeed in forcing turnovers and getting out in transition, but it could never get closer than 15 points for the entire second half.

The hot shooting early on was a vast difference from the first matchup between the two teams, when the Hawks overcame a difficult start to defeat the Red Devils by 1 after Nelson hit three free throws in the closing seconds.

“Tonight, we came out and asserted ourselves from the start and got them down early and were just able to play our game and take our time and wait for the open shot and continue to hit it throughout the game,” Ambrosius said.

Gueths, who is the conference’s leading scorer, was held to 6 points, but Kohl (19), Nelson (19) and Richards (16) provided plenty of offense.

The 75 points were the most scored by the Hawks this season, but the effort wasn’t a surprise to Ambrosius, whose team knocked down 11 3s. He sees the team hit those shots all the time in practice.

“To those of us who watch this team in practice every day, it doesn’t surprise us,” Ambrosius said. “We see it all the time. It was just nice to come out here and do it in a big game and do it in a big-game atmosphere as well.”

East senior Everett Laye, who came into the night second in the Bay Conference in scoring at 16 points per game, tallied 14.

Green Bay East (52)

Laye 5 3-4 14, Crockett 4 0-2 8, Betton 1 0-0 2, Warren 2 2-4 6, Carlton 2 3-6 7, Miller 1 0-0 3, Bowers 3 3-5 10, Kaltz 0 0-1 0, Davis 1 0-0 2.

Shawano (75)

Richards 6 1-1 16, Nelson 5 5-6 19, Lacy 1 0-0 3, Hesse 0 2-2 2, Bartz 2 2-7 6, Johnson 1 0-0 2, Kohl 8 0-0 19, Maltbey 1 0-0 2, Gueths 2 2-2 6.

Green Bay East 19 33 — 52

Shawano 35 40 — 75