ASHLAND – It almost seemed like Paxon Ediger spent much of January slowly building a nice, sensible portfolio of a budding basketball career.
Then on Friday night inside Arrow Arena against Madison in his February opener, the Ashland sophomore chose to just hit the lottery instead.
Perhaps the biggest key to Ashland’s expanding turnaround, Ediger scored the Arrows’ first 14 points and hit five 3-pointers in the first quarter of a 66-47 victory over the Rams.
By night’s end, the 6-foot guard had 30 points – the most of any AHS player this season – and was 8-of-11 shooting from downtown, leaving him just two treys short of the 1992 single-game program record of 10 held by Chad Honaker.
“Pax was just going off and everybody knew it,” classmate and fellow guard Gabe Baith said. “So it was just like, ‘Feed him, look for him.’ ”
Ediger had been showing signs of being an explosive scorer, dropping in team-high totals between 14 and 19 points in January games against Mansfield Senior, Lexington and Mount Vernon. He’d even netted 23 in a nonconference game Dec. 30 against Big Walnut.
But Friday’s money-in-the-bank showing is sure to put him on every opponent’s watch list from here on out.
Ediger had 22 points at the half, matched Nathan Bernhard with a team-high six rebounds and helped the Arrows (8-10, 5-7 Ohio Cardinal Conference) improve to 5-2 in their last seven games after a 3-8 start.
“He’s really kind of taken over and kind of been that catalyst for us that makes us go offensively,” Ashland coach Jason Hess said. “The one thing that he’s been struggling at a little bit was shooting the ball from the perimeter, and you wouldn’t be able to tell that by the way he shot it tonight.
“I could see tonight he had a little more lift on his shot and he looked really good.”
The Arrows needed every bit of it out of the gate against Madison (1-16, 1-10). Despite Ediger’s heroics, the Rams traded leads with Ashland four times inside the game’s first 12 minutes, as Kaleb Gordon (11 points) and Owen Wigton (9) were firing right back.
The all-around offensive explosion to start the game was anything but expected. The Arrows had beaten Madison just 44-33 on Dec. 29 – their fewest points in a win in nearly seven years.
On Friday, though, AHS was up 23-20 after a quarter, a pace that would have led to a 92-80 final score.
Less than 2 minutes into the second quarter, the Rams were in front 25-23 following a 3-pointer from Justin McCraney, and they closed the half with six treys of their own.
“They shot it really well, we shot it really well and it was one of those things where it was just kind of contagious going back and forth,” Hess said.
But Ashland finished the second quarter on a 16-3 run that included five more points from Ediger and a pair of triples from Baith (10 points). Madison couldn’t rediscover its offensive footing from there.
“I’ve seen growth with our guys,” Rams coach Chris Armstrong said. “We started with a young group kind of finding their way … and they’re fighting through a lot of adversity.
“Defensively, we’ve got to adjust better from game to game,” he added. “… We didn’t do a good enough job of finding those shooters.”
Max Swaisgood buried a pair of triples in a third quarter that saw Ashland outscore the visitors, 14-5. The hosts built a 53-33 lead into the fourth and ended up with 12 3-pointers as a team (all in the first three quarters) on about 50 percent shooting from downtown.
After losing their first six home games, the Arrows now have won three in a row at Arrow Arena. Friday’s scoring was their second-best output in an OCC game, and they improved to 5-1 when holding opponents below 50 points.
“Pax’s shots that he made, it made everybody else feel more confident about their shots,” Baith said. “When you have that momentum it just keeps leading to everybody else.”
The Rams got team-high numbers in both points (13) and rebounds (7) from senior Will Kepple, but after getting within 31-28 midway through the second quarter, they hit just two of their next 17 shots through the end of the third.
“We started hunting our own shot instead of hunting a good shot,” said Armstrong, who credited Kepple with solid all-around play this season.
The Arrows doubled the Rams on the glass, 34-17, with the 6-foot-5 Bernhard (9 points, 6 rebounds) providing a consistent presence under the basket.
After opening OCC play with a 1-5 record, Ashland could finish .500 in the league if they can knock off both Mount Vernon (Feb. 9) and West Holmes (Feb. 16) in their last two home games.
Hess said his squad’s balanced rebounding with guys like Bernhard, Baith, Tyler Sauder and Isaac Stewart has been a key to the recent uprising. But he also said the sophomore duo of Ediger and Baith has been critical.
“The two of them are really starting to play off of each other on both ends,” said coach, now just two wins from 100 in his ninth season leading AHS.
“Defensively, some of the switches and some of the stuff that they’re doing out there, they’re just playing basketball now, as opposed to being so uptight and trying to figure things out.”
Both Ashland and Madison are on the road Saturday for nonconference games, with the Arrows heading to Massillon Washington (10-5) and Madison at Norwalk (12-3 entering Friday).
