Campbell comeback not quite enough

By Ryan Jones

The Red Devils trailed by 18 before falling 63-58 to Smithville.

CANTON — If you’ve seen the Campbell Memorial High boys basketball team play a game this season, you’d know that the Red Devils are capable of making improbable come-from-behind runs to secure victories.

Campbell trailed by 18 points in their last game — a district final tilt — against Waterloo before posting a 76-73 victory.

So when the Red Devils fell behind by 18 points to No. 1 ranked Smithville in Wednesday’s second quarter of a Division III regional semifinal at Canton Memorial Fieldhouse, hopes of a comeback still remained.

Campbell (18-6), bolstered by 19 second-half points from Jerah’me Williams, outscored the Smithies in each of the final three periods before falling 63-58.

Smithville (24-0) will square off against Cleveland Central Catholic, 51-39 winners against LaBrae, in a regional final on Saturday at 7:30 p.m.

“The kids are devastated,” Campbell coach Brian Danilov said about the loss. “They’re very emotional after the game, but if they weren’t those type of kids we wouldn’t have made it this far.”

A driving lay-up from Williams, who led Campbell with 26 points and five assists, with about 3:15 left in the fourth period cut the lead to five, 53-49.

However, the Smithies responded with a 6-0 run over the next two minutes and had a 59-49 advantage with 57 seconds remaining.

“We had it down to five and didn’t score for the next couple of minutes,” Danilov said. “That really hurt us.”

Smithville coach Michael Snowbarger said his team has responded to runs most of the year.

“Triway made pushes at us in our last game and we came back each time,” Snowbarger said. “We knew Campbell was going to be a tough match-up. They are quick and if they are making their shots they are tough to beat.”

Williams canned two threes in the final 23 seconds, but four free throws from Corey Caldwell and Kenny Kornowski cemented the Smithville win.

The 6-4 Caldwell (21 points) and 6-8 Kornowski (30 points) combined to score 51 of the Smithies 63 points. The duo also asserted themselves on the backboards as Kornowski collected 19 rebounds and Caldwell 10.

“Those two hurt us down low,” Danilov said. “The 49 to 30 rebounding advantage pretty much told the story of the game, even with our poor shooting performance.”

Snowbarger said he told his team to hit the boards hard.

“We had to rebound at both ends,” he said. “Kenny and Corey are hard workers and extremely hard to box out. I thought we were sloppy at times tonight. We scored a lot off of junk offense. We need to execute our half court stuff better if we are going to advance.”

Campbell dug itself a hole by losing the first quarter 20-8.

“I thought the kids were trying too hard,” Danilov said about the first period. “We rushed our shots and we weren’t getting second opportunities. When you shoot 3-of-16 in the first quarter, nobody got off to a good start.”

Snowbarger said his team focused on taking away Williams and Nate Hodge on offense.

“They were the two we had to contain them if we were going to win,” he said. “We didn’t want Williams to get any open looks because he can catch fire. Beau Carpenter and Corey Caldwell did a great job on them. Caldwell [six blocked shots] is really long and athletic and was able to give space and still contest shots.”

Tyler Bates led Smithville with nine assists, and Kornowski swatted a game-high seven shots.

Dorian Jones had seven points and five rebounds for Campbell, while Lester Hughes netted nine points in the loss. The Red Devils went 22-of-64 (34 percent) from the field for the contest.