Culver Wins Again
By Ken Peterson
CULVER � Four years after picking up its last victory, Oregon-Davis was looking to end its long losing streak Wednesday night.
Culver Community would have nothing to do with it.
Led by Tim Day�s 15 points and 12 from Dustin Desabatine, the Cavaliers used a pair of runs to hold off Oregon-Davis 54-43 at Culver Community High School.
The win improves coach Brett Berndt�s squad to 2-10 heading into Friday�s Northern State Conference home game against LaVille. Coach Travis Hannah�s Bobcats fall to 0-15 heading into its next game two weeks from Wednesday at home against Michigan City Marquette.
Berndt can sympathize with the struggles Hannah�s going through. O-D hasn�t won a game since it beat Culver 41-37 in the 1999 Class A Culver Sectional semifinals.
�We�ve been through this before,� he said. �We had a 47-game losing streak five years ago and I was here as the freshmen coach. And everybody was saying the same thing �We can�t lose to Culver.� I know the situation that they�re in. And Oregon-Davis came in and thought that if they were going to get one, this was going to be it.�
Despite cutting the margin to five in the third quarter and seven with less than two minutes to go, the Bobcats were unable to get over the hump.
Still, Hannah saw plenty of fight in his team, something he hasn�t seen all year.
�At the beginning of the year, they would have rolled over and laid there and waited until it was all over,� he said. �To me, you have to have kids with a little bit of heart and a little bit of attitude in order to play this game. I don�t think people understood that we were building from scratch. And that goes for attitude and work ethic and that�s where we�re building from.�
D.J. Jensen led the Bobcats with 13 points and Shaun Johnston added 11.
Culver was able to get to the line more than O-D. For the game, the Cavaliers finished 14-of-23 while the Bobcats were just 2-of-4.
Things looked good for O-D early on as Matt Baughman scored three straight baskets to give the Bobcats a 6-2 lead. But Culver responded with nine unanswered points to take the lead.
After Seth Dickson gave O-D its final lead at 12-11 late in the first quarter, Day�s basket in the final minute of the first quarter sparked a 12-0 Culver run.
And although the Cavaliers never surrendered the lead after that, the Bobcats made things interesting enough to cause a few anxious moments on the Culver bench.
�I wasn�t too happy with the way we played,� Berndt said. �I was nervous before the game. We�re such an up and down team and there�s time where we�ve played decent basketball. And in our last three games, I�ve been pretty pleased. I was hoping we could show that effort. But we didn�t.�
The Culver lead was nine in the fourth quarter when the Cavaliers looked like they were going to meltdown.
Troy Elliott was called for a foul and was assessed a technical foul for arguing with the official. The Bobcats converted on two of the four free throw attempts to cut the margin to seven, but that was as close as O-D would get.
�We played good in spurts, but if you want to beat a good team you have to play 32 minutes,� Berndt said. �I was disappointed in the way we played, but you take a win anyway you can get it.�
For Hannah, his job remains to keep things positive while trying to turn the program around.
�Obviously, games like this aren�t fun and this one hurts so bad,� he said. �I think we have a young team with one senior, four juniors and very little varsity experience that practices are fun. We�re trying to make this as fun as we can. Obviously, losing isn�t fun. You have to make it fun. Even though we lost the game, the kids are having fun and are working their tales off. And that�s a start.�
Oregon-Davis won the J.V. game 43-31 behind 11 points from Devin Akers. Will Roberts had 10 for Culver Community.
CULVER COMMUNITY 54, OREGON-DAVIS 43
At Culver
CULVER COMMUNITY (54): Levi Scroggs 0 4-6 4, Dustin Desabatine 5 0-0 12, Kameran Snyder 2 5-6 9, Nathan Caudill 1 0-0 2, Troy Elliott 0 1-4 1, Tim Day 7 1-1 15, Matt Carter 3 2-4 8, Tyler Weldon 1 1-2 3. TOTALS: 19 14-23 54.
OREGON-DAVIS (43): Dean Goble 1 0-0 3, Seth Dickson 1 0-0 2, Matt Baughman 3 0-0 6 , Len Ricciardi 2 0-0 4, James Mangold 1 0-0 2, D.J. Jensen 5 1-2 13, Shaun Johnston 5 1-2 11. TOTALS 18 2-4 43.
Score by quarters
Culver 13 28 39 54
O-D 12 19 30 43
3-pointers: Culver 2 (Desabatine 2), Oregon-Davis 3 (Jensen 2, Goble 1). Total fouls (fouled out): Culver 9, Oregon-Davis 21 (Jensen Baughman)
Records: Culver 2-10, Oregon-Davis 0-15.
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