Wheaton College rallies for overtime victory

Sometimes you have to sweat out a victory.

“I’ve been doing this a long time,” said Wheaton College coach Mike Schauer, perspiration dripping down his face after his team’s 78-76 overtime victory Saturday against visiting Illinois Wesleyan. “That’s one of the best small-college games you’re ever going to see. Just two teams, it was a big game for both teams, and two teams that just refused to get beat tonight.”

“It was a great game,” added senior guard Andrew Jahns. “They always play us tough here. We’ve had a string of great games the past couple of years.”

Illinois Wesleyan (16-6, 7-4 CCIW) led the entire first half, but the teams traded the lead 11 times and were tied 10 more after halftime, including when the Titans’ Sean Johnson took an inbounds pass and hit a 3-pointer at the buzzer to send the game into overtime.

“I was disappointed with how we defended it, and he’ll be the first to tell you he made a mistake a little bit by letting the ball go over his head,” Schauer said, pointing to Jahns, who guarded Johnson. “But I probably made a mistake by telling us to be a little too aggressive on that play. But he’s made a lot of big shots.”

Jahns agreed.

“Obviously, I made a pretty big mistake at the end of regulation, but he hit a great shot,” Jahns said. “He hit a tough shot.”

But Jahns said the Thunder (16-7, 7-5) was confident it would win in overtime.

“We had the momentum coming from regulation,” the Wheaton North graduate said. “They hit a really big shot, but we were fully confident going into overtime that we were going to win. We were on our home court, and we wanted to defend our home court.”

The Titans never led in overtime, but the Thunder took its biggest lead of the game, 78-73, with 1:33 left on freshman Tyler Peters’ 3-pointer that just beat the shot clock.

“His 3 was huge, because once we got it to a 5-point lead I think our team believed,” Schauer said.

The Titans’ Matt Schick responded with a 3 of his own, but Spencer Schulze blocked a Doug Sexauer shot with 18 seconds left, then Johnson missed another buzzer-beating 3.

“I thought Sean might make that one too,” Schauer said.

Sexauer led all scorers with 32 points and added 10 rebounds. Johnson scored 15.

“He’s a great player, and they really abused us with him,” Schauer said of Sexauer.

Tim McCrary led Wheaton with 21 points and 15 rebounds. Schultze added 14 points, Jahns 12 and Peters 11.

There was a scary moment on the court with 11:19 remaining in the second half when Titans senior guard Travis Rosenkranz lost his footing while cutting to the basket and fell to the floor as the ball rolled out of bounds. Rosenkranz lay motionless on the floor until being taken away via ambulance with an apparent concussion. The teams resumed play after a 20-minute delay.

“The first thing I want to say is our thoughts and prayers are with Travis Rosenkranz,” Schauer said. “Illinois Wesleyan is one of the classiest programs in the country, right from the top with (athletic director) Dennie Bridges all the way to (coach) Ron Rose to their players: Sean Johnson, Travis, Doug Sexauer. They’re just classy people, and while I’m thrilled to have won, I hope Travis is OK.”