BOWLING GREEN — Chek Washington wouldn’t elaborate on the finer points of his conversation with Perrysburg’s Nick Moschetti, but whatever was said must not have been suitable for younger ears.
“It was just a little communication going on, that’s it,” Washington said with a laugh when asked about the fourth quarter altercation — the two had to be separated by officials after Washington was whistled for his fourth personal foul.
With the gritty Washington doing the dirty work on the defensive end and high-scoring super sub DeJorr Gibson orchestrating the offense, Mansfield Senior won its first district title since 2006 with a 43-29 win over Perrysburg at Bowling Green State University’s Stroh Center on Saturday.
The Tygers (18-7) will play Toledo Bowsher in the regional semifinals at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the University of Toledo’s Savage Hall. Bowsher knocked off Toledo St. John’s 63-48 on Saturday.
A Division I football recruit committed to Ohio University, Washington was largely responsible for shadowing Moschetti, an All-Northwest District first-team selection who scored his 1,000th career point earlier this season. The 6-foot-3 senior sharpshooter, who came in averaging 22.6 points a game, managed just eight points on 2-for-21 shooting.
“And 0-for-7 from 3-point range,” Senior High coach J.T. Reese pointed out. “For us, that’s what we wanted to do. They live and go through Nick and I thought tonight, we caused him fits.”
The Tygers dug themselves an early hole against the Yellow Jackets (21-4). Mansfield Senior trailed 8-3 after the first quarter, but outscored Perrysburg 40-21 the rest of the way.
“Initially we were in the right place defensively. We kept the pressure up,” Reese said. “They made a couple shots and we made a couple silly mistakes, especially at the beginning, but I thought at halftime we were in a good place.
“We were guarding the snot out of them. I thought, as the game went on, they would get more tired and wouldn’t want to handle the ball.”
Mansfield Senior’s suffocating defense began to take its toll in the second half. The Tygers, who led 17-15 at halftime, outscored the Jackets 7-2 over the final 4:29 of the third quarter to take a 26-19 lead to the fourth.
“Once (the lead) got to five, I thought they became a more poised team,” veteran Perrysburg coach Dave Boyce said. “Ever miss we had, we just felt that was the biggest shot no matter how much time was left in the game.”
Perrysburg cut Senior High’s lead to 26-21 early in the fourth quarter on a pair of Nate Patterson free throws, but would get no closer. The Tygers responded with a 8-0 run to put the game out of reach. Jalen Reese scored four points during the spurt and six of his eight in the period.
Perrysburg trimmed its deficit to 36-29 with 1:58 to play on Matt Kaczinski’s putback, but another Reese layup and a traditional three-point play by Mario Davison pushed Senior High’s lead to 41-29 with 1:02 remaining. Both coaches emptied their benches shortly thereafter.
Mansfield Senior forced 16 turnovers and limited the Yellow Jackets to 10 of 44 shooting. Perrysburg was 0-for-12 from beyond the 3-point arc.
“I don’t think we took a lot of shots in the flow of our offense and that hurt,” Boyce said. “That’s what we’ve done well all year, and we play well in the open court when we we’re under control. They got us sped up and we never quite got it under control.
“We’ve seen some teams like that … but they had more quick, tough guys than anybody we saw.”
Gibson came off the bench to score a game-high 17 points on 6-for-11 shooting. The senior had a team-high three assists and three steals.
“He knows exactly what angles to attack,” Reese said. “He got in there and he was strong with the ball. Once the ball goes through the basket for him once or twice, it gets a little bigger. Then it really started rolling.”
Gibson was a calming influence early, scoring six points in the second quarter as the Tygers outscored Perrysburg 14-7 in the period.
“We just had to get ourselves under control,” Gibson said. “Not everybody had been to this stage before so it was probably just nerves, but once we got settled in everything was great.”
The Tygers scored 19 points off Perrysburg’s 16 turnovers. Six of Senior High’s eight first-half baskets came off steals or after blocked shots.
“What we had to do is turn our defense into our offense,” Reese said. “That was our best offense tonight.”
Mansfield Senior advanced to the district title game last year only to fall to Anthony Wayne at BGSU. The Tygers looked more comfortable Saturday, which was no accident.
“Not only did last year help us, but we came here and won the summer shootout with the same group of guys,” Reese said. “Once we got here today it wasn’t shock and awe. We’ve been here before, we’ve seen the rims and we knew exactly what we had to do to (get) the win.”
Follow Curt Conrad on Twitter @curtjconrad.
“Once we got here today it wasn’t shock and awe. We’ve been here before, we’ve seen the rims and we knew exactly what we had to do to (get) the win,” said Coach J.T. Reese.
