Coleman, Prater score 15 each, help Rochester drub Bobcats

Zebras open game with 22 straight points

BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS

Sports Editor, RTC

Drew Bowers Owen Prater

HAMLET — The Rochester boys basketball team won the game they played against host Oregon-Davis Tuesday.

But the game that did not involve them that might have mattered even more did not go their way, ending their Three Rivers Conference title hopes.

Sophomore Brady Coleman came off the bench to score 15 points, Owen Prater also had 15, and Drew Bowers poured in 10 as the Zebras rolled to a 70-26 win at the Bobcat Den.

Ten different Rochester players scored, and five different players hit a 3-pointer.

Keegan D.J. Garland led O-D with 11 points, and 6-6 senior center Carson Matthew added seven, all in the third quarter. O-D lost their fifth straight game and dropped to 2-19 overall and 0-10 at home.

Rochester improved to 16-4. They have won nine of their last 10.

Elsewhere Tuesday, in the game that mattered to their TRC title chances, Manchester handled Whitko 78-53 in South Whitley to clinch a share of the conference title and eliminate Rochester, who is 6-2 in conference play, from title contention. Northwestern, who went 7-2 in conference play, was also eliminated.

Rochester scored the first 22 points of the game at which point coach Rob Malchow called timeout with 2:26 left in the first quarter and put in his subs.

“I just told them to come out and execute our game plans,” Malchow said. “Usually that leads to some good offense.”

Coleman had as many points as the entire O-D team had in the second quarter (nine). He has received scant varsity minutes this season while starring for the JV. This time most of his playing time came in the varsity game.

“He’s stuck with it well,” Malchow said. “I know he’s led the JV guys and done a good job there. Tonight’s game was similar to that. And he was able to take advantage of some playing time and knock down some shots.”

The lead was 30 at halftime, but O-D kept within 47-21 in the third quarter courtesy of three post buckets from Matthew and a Brady Danford 3-pointer before the Zebras launched another 15-0 run.

Prater scored on a putback, Prater scored in transition off a Bowers assist, and Prater scored on another putback, beating the defense down the court. Then Tanner Reinartz hit two free throws and then a 3-pointer to make it 58-21 and start the running clock, per the IHSAA Mercy Rule.

A Prater pullup in the lane and a Bowers steal and layup in which he outhustled his point guard counterpart Garland to a loose ball made it 62-21.

Malchow’s pregame message was better ball movement, and the team needed barely three minutes to score 13 points.

A Bowers driving layup and a Bryce Baugher transition layup necessitated O-D coach Larry Sennert calling a timeout 48 seconds into the game. A Reinartz tip-in, a Carson Paulik corner 3-pointer in transition, a Bowers steal and layup and a Prater transition layup made it 13-0.

O-D called another timeout. Matthew missed two free throws. Baugher drilled a 3-pointer, Prater found a cutting Bowers for a layup, Xavier Vance scored off a Baugher assist, and Vance scored again on a putback to make it 22-0.

“Coach came out at the beginning of the game in the locker room and told us that we need to start moving the ball a little bit better,” Baugher said. “We listened pretty well, I think, and we executed, I guess.”

Baugher said the team has come out with “some fire” in wins over Peru and O-D after a home loss to Triton. He also said the team continues to play for assistant coach Luke Smith, whose 16-month-old son Ford is hospitalized in Florida.

“A lot,” Baugher said when asked how much the players want to win for Smith and his family. “I can’t even describe it. It would be awesome to win.”

Rochester can play spoiler against host Maconaquah in their regular season finale Friday. If they win, then Manchester wins the TRC outright. If Maconaquah wins Friday, then they share the TRC with Manchester.

Rochester and Maconaquah have split their last eight meetings. Maconaquah’s Josiah Ball, a Bethel recruit, is third in the state with a 28.3 scoring average.

“They’ve become a rivalry for us,” Malchow said. “It’s going to be their senior night like Peru was ours, so there’s going to be some emotion for them, and I look forward to it being a tough game, and hopefully, we can go down and play well. We’ve had some success down there. Last time we were there, we didn’t (an 80-31 loss in 2023). We usually play well down there, so hopefully we will this Friday.”

Rochester also won the JV game 44-14, which was shortened to two quarters due to O-D’s lack of numbers. Mitchell Clark had 10 points, Aiden Wilson and Conner Dunfee had six each, Ashton Musselman and Carlos Plascencia had five each, Grayson Miller and Brady Coleman had four each, and Owen Lett and Trenton Meadows had four each.

Rochester 70, Oregon-Davis 26

ROCHESTER (70) (16-4)

Drew Bowers 5 0-0 10, Carson Paulik 1 0-0 3, Owen Prater 7 0-0 15, Bryce Baugher 2 1-2 6, Tanner Reinartz 2 2-2 7, Brady Coleman 7 0-0 15, Conner Dunfee 0 0-0 0, Jonas Kiser 0 0-0 0, Grant Clark 1 0-0 2, Jack Reffett 1 0-0 2, Xavier Vance 3 0-0 6, Mitchell Clark 2 0-0 4

TEAM: 31 3-4 70

OREGON-DAVIS (26) (2-19)

Keegan D.J. Garland 4 2-2 11, Trevor Campbell 0 0-0 0, Aiden McCallum 1 0-0 2, Brady Danford 1 0-0 3, Carson Matthew 3 1-4 7, Keegan Goble 1 0-0 3, Casey Koch 0 0-0 0, Taylor McKeehan 0 0-0 0, Connor Matthew 0 0-0 0, Matt Wringer 0 0-0 0, Trevor Gonzalez 0 0-0 0, Riley Berg 0 0-0 0

TEAM: 10 3-6 26

Three-point field goals:

Rochester 5 (Coleman, Prater, Reinartz, Baugher, Paulik),

Oregon-Davis 3 (Garland, Goble, Danford)

Total fouls: Rochester 5, Oregon-Davis 4

Turnovers: Rochester 12, Oregon-Davis 13

Score by quarters

Rochester 24 17 21 8 – 70

Oregon-Davis 2 9 12 3 – 26

JV: Rochester 44, Oregon-Davis 14