The 6-3 junior forward scored 15 of his team-high 16 points in the second half as the Firebirds beat Springfield 54-56 in a Greater Western Ohio Conference game on Tuesday night at Springfield High School.
Fairmont went on an 18-9 run in the third quarter to earn their first win in nearly two weeks. They dropped back-to-back games to Tri-Village and Northmont.
“It’s a big win for us,” said Fairmont coach Eric Trent. “We were really resilient. They went on a run at the beginning. We’ve had a rough few games. We’ve had some sickness, like everyone at this point. We showed a lot of composure there, which is something we’ve been looking for — to have team composure against pressure. I thought we did a lot better against that tonight."
Wildcats senior Sherrod Lay had a team-high 20 points and EJ Rice had 10 for Springfield, which opened the game on an 8-0 run. They led 18-13 after the first quarter and extended it to 27-21 at the half.
“We were kind of forcing it,” McGraw said of the Firebirds first half. “I was forcing it myself, not passing out (to teammates). And then we started passing it around and back cutting, doing what we do and it worked better.”
In the third quarter, McGraw scored eight points as the Firebirds went on a 10-2 run to take the lead for the first time at 35-33.
They extended their lead to 45-38 on a steal and layup by McGraw in the fourth quarter, forcing a Wildcats timeout. Springfield cut the lead to three points at 49-46 on a 3-pointer by Lay, but wouldn’t get any closer.
“We played a really concerted defensive effort on McGraw,” said Wildcats coach Matt Yinger. “We know everything kind of runs through him. At halftime, we talked a lot about making sure that we build our wall and continue to surround him with bodies and unfortunately, he established post position a bit too frequently in the third quarter, kind of put his team on his back. He had a really effective quarter and you couple that with some turnovers and sloppy play, it was rough a third quarter.”
The Firebirds improved to 5-4 and 4-2 in the GWOC. They remained one-game back of Northmont (7-3, 5-1), Centerville (7-2, 5-1) and Wayne (8-1, 5-1).
“(Springfield’s) a tough place to play and the GWOC this year is going to be tough,” Trent said “It’s going to be a battle every single game, so anytime we get a GWOC win, it’s huge, but especially here against a really talented team. They’re really athletic, really talented. They’re well-coached as well, so it was big for us. We needed it.”
The Wildcats (4-5, 2-3) have held third quarter leads in three of their four GWOC losses this season. They’ll look to get back on track at Beavercreek on Friday night and “build from there,” Yinger said.
“We’re not far off, but we don’t want to keep saying that,” Yinger said. “We want to put the puzzle pieces together, get a win and get things steered in the right direction.”
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