By Bud Milroy
Sports Correspondent
Mike Ramczyk
Sports Editor
The Catholic Central boys basketball squad continued its roll Tuesday with a 61-47 Metro Classic Conference victory over Racine St. Catherine’s (10-3, 6-2 MCC) in Burlington.
The Toppers improved their record to 10-2 overall and 6-1 in conference play with the win over St. Cat’s, ranked third in Division 4. The Toppers, ranked 3rd in Division 5, trail Whitefish Bay Dominican (the top-ranked Division 4 team) by one game in the conference standings.
The win is also their second victory over a ranked opponent (Kenosha St. Joseph’s) in the last week and is the seventh straight for the Toppers.
“I am extremely proud of our guys,” said coach Eric Henderson. “We executed our game plan extremely well and were able to get balanced scoring. Bailey did an outstanding job of getting us into our half-court offense. A total team effort, and to be able to compete against a team with the tradition of St. Catherine’s and the respect I have for Coach Letsch, are unmatched.”
The second quarter was all Catholic Central. Ben Heiligenthal opened the quarter with a drive and one to put the Toppers up three points. Spencer Wilker knocked down a three from the top of the key, and Wright scored on a drive down the lane.
Wright then hit back-to-back threes to push the Catholic Central lead to 29-15.
St. Catherine’s finally got their first point of the quarter with 2:56 left when Joe Namowicz split a pair of free throws. A steal by Romeo Bouie and his layup as time expired made the score 29-18 at the intermission.
The Toppers continued to extend their lead in the third quarter. With a pair of threes by Wilker and another by Wright, Catholic Central led by 21 points before St. Cat’s scored a pair of baskets in the final minute to make the score 44-27 at the end of three quarters.
The lead reached 24 points as the Toppers handled the St. Cat’s full-court press for the first five minutes of the quarter.
Over the final three minutes, the pressure defense got to the Toppers and St. Cat’s trimmed the lead to the final 14-point margin.
Catholic Central featured a balanced scoring attack with four players scoring in double figures. Wilker and Wright shared the team high with 16 points each. Miles added 12 points, and Heiligenthal chipped in 11.
Bouie led all scorers with 23 points for St. Catherine’s, 15 of them coming in the final couple minutes. Jersey Eickhorst was also in double figures with 14 points.
The Toppers will return to action Monday when they travel to Williams Bay to face Faith Christian at 7 p.m.
Toppers outsmart St. Joe’s in final seconds
If you ask most high school basketball coaches if they would simply give an opponent an easy bucket in the closing seconds, 99 out of 100 may look at you funny.
But not Catholic Central boys hoops coach Eric Henderson. At least not on Jan. 16 in a huge conference showdown.
In a somewhat bizarre move, the visiting Toppers, Division 5′s fourth-ranked squad, allowed Kenosha St. Joseph, D4′s ninth-ranked team, an uncontested layup with 8 seconds left to cut the Central lead to 50-49.
Why would a coach let his opponent do this, you ask?
Well, that’s where the genius comes in.
Moments after the layup swished through the net, Catholic Central senior Spencer Wilker nonchalantly picked up the ball, walked slowly out of bounds and just waited. Seven seconds, six, five, time was running out. Suddenly, with only 2.5 seconds left in the game and the Toppers holding that one-point lead, Wilker called timeout.
A team is allowed five seconds to inbound the basketball, and the Toppers took full advantage of that rule. An inbound pass and two Wilker free throws gave St. Joe’s a mere 1.5 seconds to go the length of the floor.
However, a desperation half-court attempt was way off, and the Toppers escaped with their fifth straight win, a 52-49 nail-biter that moved Catholic Central past St. Joe’s and into third place in the loaded Metro Classic Conference.
The Toppers are now 8-2 overall and 4-1 in the MCC. They’ll have a chance to knock off second-place Racine St. Cat’s, Division 3′s third-ranked team, on Tuesday in Burlington.
Spencer Wilker (32) led the Toppers with 13 points Thursday. Whether it’s making clutch free throws, the perfect pass or taking a charge, Wilker consistently displays the necessary intangibles. (John Fisher/Standard Press)
Catholic Central trailed, 39-37, after three quarters, and it remained close throughout the fourth quarter.
Senior center Tegan Miles, who stands 6-foot-7, took over down the stretch for the Toppers. With just under two minutes to play, his turnaround 7-foot bank shot gave Catholic Central the lead for good at 46-45. Miles followed that up with two clutch free throws to extend the lead to 48-45.
Miles played most of the fourth quarter with four fouls and said he was forced to play it safe.
“It was a great team win,” he said after the game. “We played solid defense. We feel very confident as a team, and we’re playing together. We want to win conference and get to state.”
Wilker led the Toppers with 13 points and always seemed to come up with a big shot or a key pass. Bailey Wright and Ben Heiligenthal each added 12 points. Heiligenthal notched a pivotal three-point play midway through the fourth quarter, and Wright’s two foul shots less than a minute later proved to be key.
In the first quarter, it was Wright’s sharpshooting (three 3-pointers) that helped the Toppers gain an early advantage.
Miles finished with nine points, seven rebounds, six assists and four blocks. The lanky, yet physical post player has been dominating foes in the paint, blocking or altering anything in his vicinity and often jumping over shorter or even less athletic bigs for rebounds.
It’s still only January, and there are almost two months left before state, but Catholic Central deserves serious consideration when it comes to Division 5 contenders. Miles rivals any center in the state, and the outside shooting of Wilker and Wright is the perfect complement in the high-low game.
Throw in dynamic scoring from anywhere on the floor from Heiligenthal and relentless hustle from Gavin Foote, Shan Gill and Karan Singh, and Central’s rotation stacks up with just about anybody.
The Toppers still have to play two-time defending Division 3 state champion Whitefish Bay Dominican.
Sprinkle in St. Joe’s one more time and a road game at Faith Christian, and it’s a guarantee that a conference title will have to be earned the hard way.
But these tests against larger schools and possibly more talented opponents week in and week out aren’t meant for short-term gratification. They’re designed for big-picture success. That means making a legitimate state push in the WIAA D5 playoffs.
Sure, it would be nice to win every game by 40 points against tiny schools.
But Henderson and the boys are built for a deep playoff run, and if that means an occasional rough loss to an opponent the caliber of Dominican, who beat Central, 47-31, a month ago, then so be it.
These Toppers wouldn’t have it any other way.
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