Raiders roll Eagles to win ORVC outright

On a night where seniors stepped onto their home floor one final time and a legendary group was inducted into the South Ripley Athletic Hall of Fame, the Raider boys basketball team capped off the night with a dominant 85-57 victory over Jac-Cen-Del in a regular season finale for the two teams.

With the victory, the Raiders are outright Ohio River Valley Conference champions for a second-straight season and have now won 17-straight games against conference teams. South Ripley also remains in possession of the Ripley County Publishing “Pride Trophy.”

It was a night in which South Ripley flexed its muscle for the second time this season against their rivals from Osgood and several Raiders got in on the action. Drew Volz led all scorers with 27 points and also tallied eight assists, seven rebounds and four steals. Eli Gilpin put up 22 points and Dylan Jessee added 13 points. Bryson Sipples, South Ripley’s lone senior, neared a double-double with 10 points and nine rebounds while also adding three assists.

Sophomore Blake Gunter swatted eight shots away and had eight points alongside six rebounds. Mason Bascom rounded out Raider scoring with five points.

Jac-Cen-Del shot just 35 percent from the field but did have two individual players shoot above 50 percent. Darian Grieshop had 24 points while Blake Wagner hit for 21 points. Lane Simon scored four points, Brody Huff added three points and both Neil Sullivan and Connor Yeggy totaled two points. Beckham Comer scored one point for the Eagles.

Simon grabbed a team-high eight rebounds.

South Ripley ends the regular season with an 18-5 record and a perfect 6-0 mark in the ORVC. The Raiders play in the Class 2A Sectional 45 semifinals on Friday night against either Brown County or host Southwestern (Hanover).

Jac-Cen-Del (4-18, 3-3 ORVC) goes to Milan for Class A Sectional 60 this week and plays Oldenburg Academy in the opening round on Wednesday.