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Greenville senior Aaron Balsbaugh hits for two of his 17 points during
second half action Friday against
Vandalia-Butler. Greenville won the
GWOC North battle 64-41.Balsbaugh also had eight rebounds
and six
blocked shots on the night. CNO Photos by Dylan Knoop
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Greenville wins
big GWOC North battle over Butler
Balsbaugh proves to be a beast in the paint
By George Starks
GREENVILLE- Greenville coach Mike Bayshore got something many coaches
would love to have.
A team that could string together four straight quarters of basketball
That is exactly what the Wave coach got Friday against the Butler
Aviators in a crucial Greater Western Ohio Conference North match.
Greenville used a solid 32 minutes of basketball to bomb the Aviators,
64-41.
“We’ve been striving for that the first couple of weeks of the season,”
said Bayshore. “It’s kind of rough getting the rust off the football
players but we played all the way through.”
Greenville junior Clay Guillozet led the Wave with 22 points but
it was the inside play of senior Aaron Balsbaugh the made the
difference.
The 6’8” big man tallied 17 points, pulled down eight boards and
blocked six shots on the night and could have run the concession stand
at halftime, not missing a beat.
A good night’s work for the big guy.
“It was a good night for him,” admitted Bayshore. “He struggled early
on and he did,’t hang his head. He kept working hard like he always
does. He got his rebounds and when he got that dunk in the first half,
I think that kind of ignited him a little bit. He was really fired up
from there on. “I’m real proud of him tonight.”
Leading 14-5 after one, the Wave opened things up in the second
quarter, taking a 30-15 lead to the locker room.
With a 15 point lead, Bayshore was quick to give credit somewhere else.
“When our offense sputtered, it was the defense that stepped up,” said
Bayshore. “We spend a lot of time in practice working on our defense. I
think that’s one area we’ve improved greatly on from last year. We keep
preaching to the kids, if you can’t hit on offense, you can always play
defense. When I was with Mr. Peltz (Dave) at Versailles, it was one of
the things we preached on. We had tried to instill this in them and I
think now, we can hang our hats on it a little bit.”
Holding the 15 point lead and winning by the 23 point margin of
victory, Bayshore was a little surprised by what the Butler defense
presented.
“They mixed in a little bit more zone than I had expected,” Bayshore
pointed out. “I thought we’d see a little bit more pressure from them.
With our guard play, a lot of teams will shy away from that pressure.
We were well prepared. We had seen a couple of their games from last
week so we knew what to expect.”
Getting a win is the goal of every team. For Greenville, the win was a
North division victory and that made it even sweeter.
”Our goal is to win the North,” said Bayshore. “You have to win every
one of them and as tough as our league is, we try not to look ahead.”
Tuesday, the Wave will entertain Trotwood-Madison.
“I think it’s going to be a battle,” said Bayshore. “We are going to
have to execute offensively and limit the turnovers. They really get
after it on the defensive end and are one of the best defensive teams
around. We are going to have to take care of the ball but I really like
our chances in that game.”
The junior varsity is set to get underway Tuesday at 6 pm.
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Wave junior Clay Guillozet drives the lane. Guillozet led the Wave in
scoring with 22 points.
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