Boys basketball: Highland gets celebration after SL American-clinching win over Aurora

GRANGER TWP. — Highland boys basketball standouts Joshua Butcher and Jake Weber had cut down nets before, but this time felt a little dull. No, not that like that. Following a 54-40 victory over Aurora that clinched the Suburban League American Conference championship Friday night, Butcher struggled to snip his piece of history to such a degree that coach Tanner Houska quipped, "He has a 4.8 GPA but doesn't know how to use a pair of scissors." Weber proved the awkward moment wasn't a fluke, taking longer than usual before someone finally came to the rescue with a new pair of scissors. The humorous struggle encapsulated the most surprising league championship since the school was founded in 1952. Not everything went to plan for a roster that returned zero starters, but the Hornets played with the efficiency of a hot knife slicing through butter when they needed to. "OK, they were not sharp," a smiling Butcher proclaimed. "(Weber) is proof that the scissors were not sharp. That's not on me." "The scissors? I don't know, dude," Weber said. "Those scissors were messed up. As soon as we got the other scissors, it was one snip, one snip, one snip and it was over. We'll blame it on the scissors, for sure." Highland (14-4, 11-2) repeated as a league champion for only the third time, joining the 1952-53 and 1953-54 Medina County League winners featuring 1,200-point scorer John Hatch and the 1997-98 and 1998-99 SL titlists, the former paced by 1,525-point Brad Reusch. The Hornets saw a three-game lead with four to play slip to one with two remaining following stunning upset losses to Revere (68-61) and Cuyahoga Falls (63-58) and weren't exactly lighting it up through 2½ quarters against the Greemen (8-10, 7-6), either. Bricking 13 of its first 14 3-pointers and leading only 31-29 midway through the third quarter, Highland finally gained some breathing room when Nick Dobkowski snapped a personal streak of 18 3-point misses when he connected from the corner to make the score 38-30. Butcher got a steal and flipped ahead to Weber for a potential three-point play with 4.6 seconds left, then rebounded Weber's missed free throw and scored to make it 42-30 at the break. The run reached 18-1 on a pair of Carson Cope free throws, starting the championship celebration a bit early. Butcher immediately asked the Copley-Tallmadge score upon checking out in the final minute, and multiple Highland fans watched the livestream of the Indians' 72-68 win that gave the Hornets the outright crown minutes after they finished their net-cutting ceremony. "It's just all of us sticking together, you know?" Weber said. "We've been in a shooting slump recently, and (Dobkowski) has been keeping the same mindset: Keep shooting. He's a shooter, and we trust him to shoot. We all have faith in each other to knock down those shots. That three sparked it. We were all hyped for him, happy for him and we played our style of basketball, no matter what the results were. "(Butcher) is a great player. He's kind of the offense. He draws so much attention, so when we have open shots we've got to take them." Butcher continued his run of being one of Medina County's hottest players as of late, putting up 20 points and 11 rebounds to give him averages of 22.2 and 7.5 over the last six games. Weber added 17 points and had five points and three assists during the game-sealing surge, Cope finished with nine and Colin Goldie snapped Highland's 0-for-10 drought from 3-point range with 1:28 left in the first half to give the Hornets their first lead. Aurora got 12 points from John Trivisonno, 11 from Luke Hilditch and 10 from Guilherme Goedert but struggled once the Hornets switched to their unique 2-1-2 zone, including air-mailing the ball into the stands on numerous occasions. The Greenmen shot 7-for-20 and committed nine turnovers while being outscored 31-20 in the second half. While the SL American race certainly appeared up for grabs, no one in their right mind would have predicted a Highland repeat. The Hornets were extremely inexperienced, but they blended quickly with an interesting set of skills between the seven rotation players that complemented each other well. Their play has been clunky at times, no doubt, but no one will remember that once the "26" banner is hanging in the gymnasium. "It's a good feeling," Butcher said. "We knew coming into the season there weren't a lot of expectations for this team because only three guys had even touched a varsity court (Butcher, Weber, Dobkowski). We were confident in what we had. We play well together and do what we need to do to come out with the win, and we got blessed with a Copley win over Tallmadge, so we're outright (champions) now." Contact Albert Grindle at (330) 721-4043 or agrindle@medina-gazette.com. Highland 54, Aurora 40 AURORA &emsp;&emsp;11 9 10 10 — 40 HIGHLAND &emsp;&emsp;8 15 19 12 — 54 Aurora — Guilherme Goedert 4-2-10, Jack Rachel 0-1-1, Luke Bonnette 2-2-6, Luke Hilditch 4-0-11, John Trivisonno 4-3-12, Max Heyes 0-0-0, Connor McLendon 0-0-0, Alex Buleski 0-0-0, Trenton Page 0-0-0, Jacoby Schadle 0-0-0, Brady Allenick 0-0-0. TOTALS: 14-8-40. Highland — Nick Dobkowski 2-0-5, Joshua Butcher 7-5-20, Jameson Gordon 0-0-0, Carson Cope 3-3-9, Jake Weber 8-0-17, Colin Goldie 1-0-3, Conner Dean 0-0-0, Ashton Gleba 0-0-0, Jackson Robertson 0-0-0, Colin Mendenhall 0-0-0, Brayden Maloney 0-0-0, Damian Cirino 0-0-0. TOTALS: 21-8-54. 3-point goals — Hilditch 3, Trivisonno, Weber, Dobkowski, Butcher, Cope. Rebounds — Aurora 23 (Trivisonno, Goedert 4), Highland 30 (Butcher 11). Assists — Aurora 4 (Goedert 2), Highland 8 (Butcher, Weber 3). Records — Aurora (8-10, 7-6) ,Highland (14-4, 11-2). Junior varsity — Highland 48, Aurora 39 (H: Noah McCourt 9).