The Arlington High School basketball team took advantage of its home gym surroundings Thursday and won the season opener in overtime.
“Bench was locked in,” junior Oliver Ladehoff said. “The crowd was hype.”
The Eagles — who are off to a 1-1 start after Saturday's 58-54 loss at Columbus Lakeview — trailed after the first, second and third periods against West Point-Beemer, but went to overtime and beat the Cadets, 46-43. After a scoreless start to extra time, senior Trent Koger got to the rim and scored a bucket before classmate Schuyler Logemann clinched the victory at the foul line.
“We shoot free throws in practice all of the time,” the guard said. “You've just got to repeat the same form over and over again.”
Coach Jake Polk's Eagles missed five of their six charity stripe attempts late in regulation, but Logemann rectified the situation with three makes in OT.
“I short-armed a couple of them earlier, but, at the end, I found a way,” he said.
Arlington did as a whole.
“We all just played hard for each other,” Ladehoff said. “Rebounded and played defense. I think defense was probably the biggest part of the game.”
The Eagles scored just 16 first-half points, but were still in the game thanks to their effort away from the offensive side. Still, though, AHS had things to fix during intermission.
“At halftime it was like, 'If it comes to you and you're open, shoot it. But, right now, we're forcing 3s,'” Ladehoff said.
Once he and Koger, who scored a team-best 17 points, started getting to the rim offensively, Arlington started cutting into West Point's lead.
“Once we finally calmed down a little bit, we got under control and we started to work the ball around and found everybody,” Logemann said.
Koger, a 6-foot-7 post player, credited teammate Killian McIntosh for getting him open with screens inside.
“He was drilling guys,” the senior said. “He was setting really good screens for me to flash in and be able to work.”
The Eagles notched their first lead of the fourth period, however, when Koger again stepped out beyond the arc. His 3-pointer with 2:03 left in the game gave Coach Polk's squad a 40-38 advantage. It grew to three points with a late Logemann free throw — one of just two made overall during the fourth — but the Cadets' Peyton Penrose tied the game with a 3-point make during the final seconds of regulation.
In overtime, though, Arlington made the plays it needed to win its opener. Koger took the ball at the top of the key and drove by his defender into the paint to retake the lead for the final time.
“I had finally made some 3s at the end, so I'd kind of gotten him enough to step out,” he said.
Koger's makes, essentially, drew out the West Point defender and, ultimately, created a bit of space on the scoreboard for the home team.
Lakeview edges Arlington
Koger scored 28 more points Saturday, but the Eagles fell 58-54 at Columbus Lakeview.
Coach Polk's squad led 45-39 going into the final period, but was outscored 19-9 in the fourth. It had won the third quarter 17-9 with Koger scoring 13 of his points to go with made buckets by Logemann and Ladehoff.
Altogether, Ladehoff finished the loss with 11 points, while Logemann had 10. John Morrison made a fourth-quarter 3-point shot and Luke Sharp scored two points, too.
Arlington next plays 7:30 p.m. today at Yutan.
AHS BASKETBALL LINE SCORES
Saturday
Columbus Lakeview 58, Arlington 54
AHS (1-1) 13 15 17 9 — 54
CL (2-0) 13 17 9 19 — 58
Scoring: AHS — Trent Koger 28, Oliver Ladehoff 11, Schuyler Logemann 10, John Morrison 3, Luke Sharp 2.
CL — Clayton Thomson 21, Grayson Vogt 13, Logan Tomky 9, Jacob Dawson 6, Levi Hrouda 4, Remi Alvarado 3, Caleb Sloup 2.
Thursday
Arlington 46, West Point-Beemer 43, OT
WPB (0-1) 12 9 13 7 2 — 43
AHS (1-0) 8 8 15 10 5 — 46
Scoring: AHS — Koger 17, Logemann 14, Ladehoff 12, Killian McIntosh 3.
WPB — Ian Schiller 10, Hunter Swanson 9, Peyton Penrose 8, Brayden Doggett 7, Conner Troyer 5, Blaize Brockman 2, Nate Vander Griend 2.
