SWATTED AWAY … Evergreen’s Will Ruetz blocks the three-point attempt of Archbold’s Wyatt Gericke.
PHOTOS BY RENEA KESSLER / THE VILLAGE REPORTER
OPEN JUMPER … Maddox Pinter gets free for a jumper in Archbold’s 76-70 win at Evergreen.
By: Joe Blystone
THE VILLAGE REPORTER
publisher@thevillagereporter.com
METAMORA (January 23, 2026) – Since we are in the dead of cold weather and snow on the ground, let’s use some winter analogies.
In the last three quarters against Archbold, Evergreen was as frigid as the temperature outside, shooting an icy 11-39 from the field.
Meanwhile, Archbold was like a snowball rolling downhill, firing at a 60 percent clip in the second quarter, then going 16-23 in the second half.
Add it all up, and those numbers translated to a 76-40 Archbold victory. “The second quarter is when we really started to establish ourselves,” veteran Archbold coach Joe Frank said.
“Once you break that first line of contain, we were getting some good shots, and when we started seeing them go through, it got contagious.”
“That’s what happened in the second half. A couple guys made some shots, and everybody sees the rim getting bigger, and we were just very fortunate it was our night and not their night.”
Wyatt Gericke and Morgan Harris each tripled in the first quarter, a sign of things to come, giving Archbold a 13-8 first-quarter lead.
Quinn Eisel’s fast break basket, then a fadeaway jumper by George Allendorf, sliced the Archbold lead to 13-12 at the end of the first.
However, Archbold rang up the first three hoops of the second to open a 19-12 lead. Harris scored off a turnover, then Gericke added two more buckets, the second off a putback, for a seven-point margin with 6:33 left in the half.
Tripp Langenderfer’s three-pointer, a fourth-chance hoop from Collin Short, and a drive by Aranjer Krieger made it 28-19.
Harris capped the Streaks’ 9-15 shooting in the quarter by hitting a triple with 3.2 on the clock that pushed Archbold up 35-23 at the break.
Harris scored seven straight points in the third to open a 44-28 bulge. Gericke tacked on six more to make it 50-28, as Archbold canned six straight shots in the middle of the third.
The telltale sign of the night was an off-balance throw by Harrison Wyse that went in to finish the quarter with Archbold up 62-33.
Archbold (10-4, 2-1 NWOAL) shot 10-14 in the third, then just for good measure, opened the fourth, hitting their first six tries at the rim to hit the running clock rule on Short’s triple with 6:00 left in the game, to make it 71-36.
Harris led all scorers with 20, Gericke had 17, and Short 11. Eisel had 15 for Evergreen (8-6, 1-2 NWOAL) and Allendorf added 14.
ARCHBOLD (76) – Short 11; Krieger 4; Pinter 2; Rufenacht 4; Langenderfer 8; Grime 0; Harris 20; Stamm 0; Wyse 5; Cline 5; Gericke 17; Totals: 20-9-9 – 76
EVERGREEN (40) – Ruetz 2; Farley 3; Q. Eisel 15; Allendorf 14; B. Eisel 0; Bolger 6; Fisher 0; Mossing 0; Rafferty 0; Shrader 0; Schwartz 0; Totals: 14-3-3 – 40
AHS 13 22 27 14 – 76
EHS 12 11 10 7 – 40