Senior leadership comes through as Eagles top North Ridgeville, 59-46

There’s leadership and then there’s leadership. Avon’s boys basketball team got a great example of quality leadership Tuesday in a come-from-behind victory over host North Ridgeville. And it came from what some might call an unlikely source as the Eagles took a 59-46 Southwestern Conference victory to up their record to 4-2 overall, 1-2 in SWC play. Shane Carty didn’t see a second of playing time for Avon, but the senior guard played what coach Mike Fitch considered to be a key role in the team’s improved play in the second half, which saw the Eagles overcome a 26-23 halftime deficit to win their third consecutive game. “We had a good talk at halftime,” Fitch said. “We have a senior captain that, honestly, didn’t play a second, who spoke up at halftime and said, ‘We’re killing ourselves. We’re doing stuff that’s killing us.’ It’s awesome that a kid like that, a senior captain, steps up and says that. It’s hard to be a captain and not see a minute but speak up like that.” The result? “I think we really controlled the game in the second half,” said Fitch. The numbers bear that out. The Eagles outscored North Ridgeville, 36-20, in the second half, led by Brooks Good, who had 12 of his game-high 20 points after the intermission, and Joey Ziegler, who scored 10 of his 13 points in the final two quarters. After Ziegler hit the team’s lone 3-pointer a little past the midpoint of the second quarter, the Eagles held a decent lead of 19-13. But the hosts went on a 13-4 run for the remainder of the period, taking a 26-23 lead at halftime. Enter Shane Carty. “There was definitely a flip switched in the locker room,” said Good, whose 20 points was a career high. “Some of our senior guys stepped up and said, ‘We’re shooting ourselves in the foot. We’ve got to come out and handle the ball better and handle adversity.’ I give Shane props for doing that. That’s his role. If he’s not going to touch the floor, then he’s got to come out and give us energy. He definitely did that, and he did a great job of it.” It didn’t take long for Avon to regain the lead. The Eagles opened the period on a 6-1 run, and with 3 minutes, 30 seconds remaining, the lead was up to 34-30. By the end of the quarter, the margin was six, 41-35. Ziegler opened the fourth by scoring four consecutive points, and when Good hit a short jumper on a nice feed from Ziegler, the lead was at 12, 47-35, and was never less than 11 the rest of the way. “I’ve got to give props to my ball handlers,” Good said. “I think they did a good job of getting downhill and finding me. They made it easy. I was just able to get the ball in the hoop.” Good scored on a variety of short jumpers and layups, often times being on the receiving end of a pass after a guard aggressively attacked the basket. “That’s the other thing we talked about at halftime,” Fitch said. “We said we’ve got to play on two feet. We were making bad decisions and playing on one foot. Brooks always plays on two feet. He’s such a solid player, making those little bunnies. He’s hard to guard when other guys attack and he’s available. He’s going to finish it strong.” While the Avon offense broke the game open in the second half, the Eagles played strong defensively throughout. The Rangers entered the contest having won six of their first eight games while averaging nearly 65 points per outing, but Avon was up to the task. “We stayed in front of them,” Fitch said. “They’re a team that can get to the basket, and they feed off of that. They make the right cuts, the right passes, everything. But if you stop them from getting there, they can’t do that.” Avon, which also got 10 points from Trevor Sykora, next plays at 6-1 Brookside on Saturday.