This story is sponsored by: The University of Wisconsin-Marshfield/Wood County
By Paul Lecker
MarshfieldAreaSports.com
Click here to view the Cloverbelt East boys basketball standings, schedule and scoreboard
MARSHFIELD – Marshfield Columbus Catholic has seven seniors on its roster, but one, Jared Fleischmann, has decided to carry the Dons on his back.
Fleischmann scored 32 points on Friday and eclipsed the 1,000-point mark for his career in a 72-52 win over Owen-Withee in a Cloverbelt Conference East Division showdown at Columbus Catholic High School.
With the victory, the Dons pull into a three-way tie for the lead in the Cloverbelt East with Owen-Withee and Neillsville at 14-3 with one conference game remaining.
The conference title will be sorted out Monday when Columbus Catholic (16-4 overall) hosts Spencer and Neillsville is at Owen-Withee.
Fleischmann used an array of dribble-drives and fade-aways in the lane, a pair of 3-pointers and a perfect 4-for-4 performance at the free throw line to total more than 30 points for the second time in less than a week. The 5-foot-10 senior had 35 points in a win against Spencer last Saturday.
Fleischmann has averaged 23.5 points per game over the Dons’ current six-game winning streak.
“I’ve been getting in the flow of the game and my teammates have been helping me,” Fleischmann said. “It’s a great honor to get it (1,000 career points). It’s been a lot of hard work in the off-season, but you’ve got to do what you’ve got to do.”
Fleischmann is fourth on the Dons’ all-time scoring list with 1,002 points in his career. He is 37 points behind Jason Linzmeier (1,039 points from 1994-97) and has a chance to move all the way up to second. Shawn Lee currently stands there with 1,097 points he accumulated between 1999-2003.
“He didn’t feel well for a good chunk of the season and the last two weeks he’s been phenomenal,” Columbus Catholic coach Joe Konieczny said. “It’s really led to some things as a team. He’s really set the tone emotionally from a leadership standpoint and the other guys are feeding off of it.”
Owen-Withee led 7-6 early before Columbus closed out the first quarter with a 10-2 run and the Dons would never trail again.
Fleischmann’s 3-pointer at the buzzer put Columbus up 16-9.
Owen-Withee scored the first six points of the second quarter but after a timeout the Dons responded by scoring the next seven – all by Fleischmann.
Fleischmann scored 12 points in the third quarter as the Dons outscored Owen-Withee 22-13 and took a 15-point lead.
Fleischmann topped the 1,000-point mark with a pair of free throws with 4:45 to go in the fourth that gave Columbus a 59-40 lead and it cruised from there.
Columbus made 15 of 20 shots from the field and 14 of 19 free throws in the second half, but a big key to its success was making Owen-Withee’s leading scorer, Albert Goerlitz, fight for everything. He was 9 of 19 from the field as he was contested tightly throughout.
“We started with guarding him with more than one guy,” Konieczny said. “We tried to make it so he would catch it a little further from the basket and whenever he did, we had two or three guys guarding him. He’s too good to stop with one guy and I think our guys that weren’t guarding him did a good job of helping Derrick (Green) whenever he caught the ball.”
Columbus will tie for the Cloverbelt East championship with a win over Spencer on Monday. The title would be the Dons’ first since winning two straight conference titles in 2010 and 2011. The game will be broadcast on WOSQ-FM 92.3 and wdlbwosq.com beginning with the pregame show at 7:10 p.m. MarshfieldAreaSports.com also will have full coverage of the game.
“We have got to come out here and play our own game, like we did today,” Fleischmann said. “We really have to be physical. They’re a physical team and we have to rebound and score, that’s about it.”
Dons 72, Blackhawks 52
Owen-Withee 9 10 13 20 – 52
Columbus Catholic 16 9 22 25 – 72
OWEN-WITHEE (52): Kolton Kaduce 1-6 1-2 4, Austin Milliren 4-12 0-1 9, John Schmelzer 0-1 0-0 0, Bryce Niemi 1-3 0-1 2, Hayden Houts 0-3 0-0 0, Albert Goerlitz 9-19 0-1 18, Will Maki 0-1 0-0 0, Josiah Goerlitz 8-14 0-1 17, Lance Renderman 1-5 0-0 2. FG: 24-64. FT: 1-6. 3-pointers: 3-13 (Kaduce 1-6, Milliren 1-2, J. Goerlitz 1-2, Renderman 0-1, Niemi 0-1, Maki 0-1). Rebounds: 27 (A. Goerlitz 9). Turnovers: 12. Fouls: 20. Fouled out: none. Record: 16-4, 14-3 Cloverbelt East.
COLUMBUS CATHOLIC (72): Alex Baierl 1-5 0-0 3, Bryce DeSmet 3-5 7-9 15, Jared Fleischman 13-19 4-4 32, Derrick Green 2-5 2-2 7, Sam Studinger 0-0 0-0 0, Christian Payant 0-0 0-0 0, Cole Mushel 0-0 0-0 0, Evan Nikolai 2-5 1-4 5, Jacob Puent 3-3 4-4 10. FG: 24-42. FT: 18-23. 3-pointers: 6-15 (Fleischmann 2-5, DeSmet 2-3, Baierl 1-5, Green 1-2, Nikolai 0-1). Rebounds: 26 (Green 7). Turnovers: 16. Fouls: 13. Fouled out: none. Record: 16-4, 14-3 Cloverbelt East.