Butler
beats buzzer, Shaler
Renwick
sets up Swartwout's winning layup
SHALER TWP— Call it poetic justice.
Butler's Logan Renwick took an inbounds pass from Brian Jendesky, found Bobby
Swartwout in the lane and watched the sophomore center sink a buzzer-beating
layup Tuesday night.
The play gave the Golden Tornado a 56-55 boys basketball victory at Shaler,
snapping a four-game losing streak and averting what would have been a
heartbreaking defeat.
With 15.9 seconds to play in a tie game, Renwick deflected a Shaler inbounds
pass in front of the Butler bench, but the ball skipped off a Titan's hands
before going out of bounds.
"I'm pretty sure the ball hit off his hand,"Renwick said. "The
referee didn't see it, I guess. That kind of stuff happens sometimes."
The ball was awarded to Shaler. Renwick deflected another pass out of bounds
with 7.1 seconds left, but Shaler freshman center John Holtz was fouled with
3.8 left. Holtz sank the first free throw and the Titans (8-8, 4-4) had a 55-54
lead.
Holtz missed the second free throw, and Swartwout grabbed the rebound and
called a timeout with 3.0 seconds to play.
"We wanted to get the inbounds pass to Bobby at the top of the
key,"Butler coach Joe Lewandowski said. "He could either drive from
there or kick it out. But they had him fronted pretty good.
"Logan outran his guy and Brian (Jendesky) did a great job of reading the
play and getting the ball to him."
Renwick accepted the inbounds pass near midcourt while moving toward the
offensive end. He noticed Swartwout open at the last second.
"It was at the very last second,"Renwick admitted. "I didn't
know how much time I had. I almost took the shot myself, but Bobby had the
higher percentage shot."
The game-winning bucket marked the 11th lead change of the night. The score was
tied on seven occasions.
"Honestly, it would have been a shame had Butler lost this
game,"Shaler coach Paul Holzshu said. "I thought they outplayed us
for 32 minutes.
"Our strategy at the end of the game was to stay in front of all of their
guys and not let the inbounds pass travel very far, then hope three seconds
wouldn't be enough time for them to get off a shot.
"Obviously, we didn't do that,"Holzshu added.
"These kids deserve this,"Lewandowski said of the win. "They've
worked so hard and they've lost a lot of tough ones late.
"We decided to extend our rotation in the first half tonight, figuring we
may have been wearing down late in games."
The Golden Tornado (6-9, 2-6) used 10 players in the first half and had a 29-28
lead at intermission.
Renwick had a season-high 13 points to go with four deflections and three
assists. He sank a 3-pointer — his first of the season — early in the first
quarter.
"You could see a big exhale there, not only from Logan, but from the rest
of the team,"Lewandowski said. "We know he can shoot the
basketball."
Swartwout had nine points and seven rebounds, and Jeff Tompkins added nine
points.
JTSchwartz scored 19 points and Holtz had 18 points and nine rebounds for the
Titans.
BUTLER 56
Cole Harvey 1-2 1-2 3, Eric King 0-1 0-0 0, Brian Jendesky 4-11 0-1 8, Logan
Renwick 4-5 4-5 13, Jeff Tompkins 4-5 0-0 9, Nate Snodgrass 1-1 3-4 5, Vinny
Schmidt 3-7 0-0 6, David Schmidt 1-1 0-0 3, Bobby Swartwout 4-4 0-0 9, Cody
West 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 22-37 8-12 56
SHALER 55
JTSchwartz 6-9 5-5 19, John Holtz 7-12 4-5 18, Dan Taylor 0-0 2-4 2, Craig
Feehan 0-0 0-0,0, Greg Friend 0-0 0-0 0, Jesse Della Valle 3-7 5-7 11, Brandon
Bauer 2-4 1-2 5 Totals: 18-32 17-23 55
Butler 17 12 11 16—56
Shaler 11 17 12 15—55
3-point goals:Renwick, Tompkins, D. Schmidt, Swartwout; Schwartz 2
JV: Butler, 44-31 (B:Cody Herald 13, Cody West 11, Vinny Schmidt 10; S:Jake
Sieber 21)