'Berg Tops B-W 100-96

Senior center Brian Schmidt (Hinkley, Ohio / Brunswick) scored a team-high 21 points as the Heidelberg College men's basketball team defeated Baldwin-Wallace College, 100-96, tonight in an Ohio Athletic Conference game in the Seiberling Gymnasium in Tiffin, Ohio.

With its win, Heidelberg improved to 13-3 overall and ended the first half of the OAC regular season schedule with a 7-2 mark. The victory also ended a two-game B-W winning streak versus the Student Princes. With its loss, B-W dropped to 5-11 overall and 2-7 in the OAC. It also was B-W's fourth-straight loss.

In the first half, B-W took an 8-7 lead at the 16:47 mark when Brendan Schuler connected on two foul shots.  Then Heidelberg went on a 15-6 run to take a 22-14 lead with 11:10 left in the half when senior guard Greg Tyson, Jr. (Lima, Ohio / Lima Senior) grabbed an offensive rebound and laid it in. The Student Princes had three leads of 16 points with the last being at 50-34 with 28 seconds left in the half when junior guard Jake Hessey (Crestline, Ohio / Colonel Crawford) made two foul shots. Heidelberg took a 50-37 lead into the locker room at halftime.

Baldwin-Wallace opened the second half with a 14-8 run to cut the lead to 58-51 when Louis Tumblin converted a three point play at the 15:28 mark. Heidelberg would then respond with a 21-10 run to take its biggest lead of the game at 79-61 when sophomore forward Travis Kinn (Alvada, Ohio / New Riegel) made a jumper with 9:51 left in the game. B-W answered with a 30-13 run to cut the lead to one point at 92-91 with 1:04 left when Bene scored on a layup.

The Yellow Jackets and Student Princes traded baskets three times before Hessey made two more foul shots for a 96-93 lead with eight seconds left.  Schuler made a foul shot to cut the lead to two with four seconds left and intentionally missed the second shot, Heidelberg got the rebound and made two foul shots to close out the scoring.

In addition to Schmidt, Hessey had a career-high 14 points and senior forward Andrew Lemmon (Port Clinton, Ohio / Port Clinton) and junior guard Chad Szalay (Lorain, Ohio / Clearview) each had 13 points. Lemmon added 10 rebounds to post a double-double.

For the Yellow Jackets, Bene had a career-high 30 points and was joined in double figures by Tumblin with 19, Schuler with 12 and Tyler Sekerak with10 points.

Heidelberg closes out a four-game home stand Saturday when it hosts Wilmington College at 3:00 p.m.