NEW BLOOMFIELD - The South Callaway Bulldogs used an energetic second half to earn the first win of the season, as the Bulldogs knocked off the New Bloomfield Wildcats by a final score of 62-55 on Friday night.
South Callaway (1-3) had to survive the raucous Homecoming crowd of New Bloomfield (4-2), as well as 28 points from the Wildcats' junior guard Jak Kitchens. However, all the Bulldogs had to do was hold onto the ball in the final quarter, bleeding the clock away en route to a big road win.
"The clock is your friend when you're up," South Callaway coach Tony Brandt said. "We really didn't call (holding the ball to drain the clock) from the bench, although we probably would have, had our guys really tried to force the issue, but they recognized that and made that decision on their own. Good call on their part."
The Bulldogs had three players score in double figures, including senior guard Brandon Ashley, who scored 10 points; junior guard Dylan Lepper, who scored 13 points; and junior guard Kaden Helsel, who led the Bulldogs with 16 points.
After trailing New Bloomfield 34-29 at halftime, Helsel scored seven of his 16 in the third quarter, sparking the Bulldogs to the win. Brandt noted bringing the energy is one of the things that Helsel excels at.
"Kaden is full of energy all the time," Brandt said. "He has a huge motor and it's always going. It's what makes him good. I got frustrated with him a couple times in the fourth quarter, but they were aggressive mistakes and he doesn't know any other way. I would rather him make those mistakes and play hard the entire game than be unsure when to go and when not to go. He's our spark plug. He's our energy guy."
On the other side of the court, New Bloomfield failed to maintain an impressive effort in the first half, as the Wildcats couldn't match the energy of South Callaway and could not prevent turning the ball over.
"We got up in the first quarter and we got satisfied with a 10-point lead and we kind of let down our guard," New Bloomfield coach Tim Gilmore said. "We gave them a ton of confidence. Defensively, I didn't feel like we did a very good job. Effort-wise, (we allowed) too many straight-line drives. We talked about mental toughness and setting in a stance and sliding our feet and small things like that make a difference."
Gilmore noted he wants to see more balanced scoring from his team, rather than relying on Kitchens to be the primary scorer every night.
"We gotta learn to score out of it," Gilmore said. "He's going to get double- and triple-teamed a lot this year and other players are going to have to step up and score the basketball too. We can't be a one man show. We have to be a team."
Gilmore believes there were a few things his team could take away from this loss, one of which is to value possessions.
"We can't ever take any possession for granted. Sometimes I feel like defensively, we're okay with people driving on us and scoring on us and we don't take it to heart. We're going to have to start taking it to heart. Scoring is great, but we have to work on our defensive stance quite a bit," Gilmore said.
Up next, South Callaway will host Blair Oaks at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday. New Bloomfield will play on the road Monday against Bunceton.