ROSS TWP. — Connor Roberts got mugged and dowsed with water when he walked into the locker room to rejoin his Talawanda High School boys basketball team.
The Brave celebrated with their first-year coach, and for good reason. They just finished playing their best game of the season.
Cale Leitch scored a game-high 21 points, Logan Smith had a double-double — 12 points and 13 rebounds — and Talawanda clinched a share of the Southwest Ohio Conference title with a 68-50 victory over Ross on Friday night.
“We told you guys. We told you guys to come in and bring it tonight,” Roberts said to his squad. “You’ve worked so hard. You battled through adversity all season long.”
Roberts started singling out players to describe the type of contributions they made before pausing.
“I can go on and say so much about every one of you guys,” Roberts continued. “Even you guys who don’t play as much. It impacts winning.
“Do you see what happens when you want it more than somebody else? Do you see what happens?”
What happened is that Talawanda (14-7, 7-3 SWOC) went from last place a season ago to first place this season in the conference. The Brave share the title with Northwest, which downed Mount Healthy on Friday.
This is Talawanda’s first-ever SWOC championship.
“I enjoy playing in those types of environments,” Leitch said of the rowdy and packed crowd inside the Ross gymnasium. “My team is everything to me. If it wasn’t for them, I wouldn’t be able to play how I’ve been playing the last couple of games — especially tonight.”
The Brave have won five out of their last six and will take the momentum into a home contest against Loveland on Saturday to wrap up the regular season. They’ll face Hamilton in the first round of the postseason tournament on Thursday, Feb. 16, at 5:30 p.m. at Lakota West.
Ross (10-12, 6-4 SWOC), which has lost six out of its last seven, begins postseason play against LaSalle on Friday, Feb. 17, at 5:30 p.m. at Lakota West.
“First, you’ve got to give them credit,” Rams coach David Lane said. “Coach Roberts has done a fantastic job with them this season. I think the kids have really rallied around him and are playing their best basketball at the right time of the season.”
The first quarter had championship vibes written all over it on Friday. Neither team stopped, and a lot of points were scored.
The shooting was superb, too.
A total of eight 3-pointers were made in the fast-pace opening period, including a trey by junior Isaac Nunn that gave Ross a 17-16 lead with 2:10 showing on the clock.
Senior Trevor Norris dropped a bucket to quickly put Talawanda back on top 18-17. That’s when the Brave began to slowly take the game into their hands.
“From the start of the season, we’ve been battling with every single team,” Smith said. “It seems like every single game comes down to the last minute with us. Tonight, we knew what we had to do to win the title.
“The hype for this game was talked about all week,” Smith added. “To get everybody here and to come out with a win, it means everything.”
Talawanda, which shot 25 of 43 (58%) from the floor, also got prime performances from sophomore Isaiah Meade-Moss (13 points) and junior Bryce James (11 points).
“What a way to kind of go out,” said Roberts, who noted that Ross and Edgewood will be leaving the SWOC to head to the Southwestern Buckeye League next season. “For us to finish this off with the way the league is right now.”
The Brave are having their best season in the 11 years the SWOC has existed. They also snapped a 13-game losing streak to Ross.
Rams senior Kellen Reid led the way with 20 points and six assists, while Nunn finished with 10 points.
“I think both teams came out hot in the first quarter and rose to the occasion,” Lane said. “I think for us it was just a lack of execution on the defensive end. I thought we had four really good practices to work on how to guard the ball screen. We really tried to attack that. The effort was there. I just don’t think we played and did what we were supposed to do on the defensive end.”
