A three-point basket by Ohio Wesleyan’s Ross Rybarczyk with 28 seconds remaining in the game proved to be the difference maker on Wednesday night. The Battling Bishops defeated Wabash College 69-66 in men’s basketball at Chadwick Court.
Wabash senior Matt Storm (Anderson, IN/Lapel) tied the game at 64-64 with two free throws with 45 seconds showing on the game clock before Rybarczyk drained the long-range jumper from the right side to put the Battling Bishops in front 67-64. Storm cut the lead to one with just five ticks remaining when he nailed a jumper to set up the final heroics.
For a brief moment, it appeared that the Little Giants had one final chance at a victory. When Ohio Wesleyan made the inbound pass after the Storm jumper, sophomore Caleb Lyttle (Sullivan, IN/Sullivan) stepped in front of the pass, knocking it away. But Wabash couldn’t come up with the loose ball as it skipped out of bounds. The Bishops fired another inbound pass and this time broke away from the Little Giant defenders, scoring a final layup just before the horn sounded.
It was a back-and-forth game throughout the first half. Wabash took an early 8-2 lead, frustrating Ohio Wesleyan’s leading scorer, senior Travis Schwab, with its double-team defense inside. But the Bishops went on a 6-0 run, capped by a three-pointer by Andy Warnock to draw even in the first four minutes. Wabash pushed the lead back up to five points before OWU tied the game again. This time it was the visitor’s turn to make a run. After battling throughout the remainder of the first half, Ohio Wesleyan outscored the Little Giants 8-2 in the final three minutes to take a 35-29 advantage to the locker room at halftime.
The Bishops continued their run to begin the second half, scoring the first five points to move in front 40-29. The lead became 12 with 11:53 left in the game before Wabash’s inside-outside combination of Kyle Coffey (Greenwood, IN/Center Grove) (left), Kyle Medeiros (Indianapolis, IN/Ben Davis), and Alex Rinks (Indianapolis, IN/Beech Grove) brought the Little Giants back into the game.
Wabash kept finding Coffey inside, setting up the 6-9 sophomore center for five of his 16 points to cut the lead to single digits. With the Bishops keeping an eye on Coffey, Medeiros and Rinks made them pay with driving layups over and over, eventually erasing the deficit to give the Little Giants a one-point lead.
That lead was short-lived. Two consecutive layups by Schwab put the Bishops back in front by three with just under five minutes left in the game. Storm answered with three of his team-best 17 points at the 3:26 mark, tying the game for the fourth time. It would be tied two more times before Rybarczyk’s shot gave OWU the final lead of the game.
The Little Giants connected on 24-of-53 shots for a steady 45-percent from the field, including 5-of-9 from the three-point arc. Wabash also outshot the Bishops at the free throw line, but could not find an answer for Schwab down the stretch. The 6-6 senior led the Bishops with 17 points. Warnock added 15 points, and Ben Chojnacki had 13.
Wabash falls to 7-11 for the season and drops its first game at home against Ohio Wesleyan in school history. The Little Giants also lost a chance to move into a tie with the Bishops for third place in the North Coast Athletic Conference standings. The Bishops move to 13-5, 7-2 in league play with the win.