Big wins push Arrows into OCC contention

By Doug Haidet

ASHLAND – Boys basketball in the Ohio Cardinal Conference is nothing if not intriguing this season.

After two monster home wins heading into the new year, Ashland is doing its part to raise eyebrows.

On Dec. 19, Arrows senior guard Paxon Ediger broke the program scoring record with 44 points in a 70-65 win over Mansfield Senior – their first home win over the Tygers since 2022.

Five days later, Ashland posted five players with double-digit points, squeezing past Lexington late, 65-63 – the team’s first home win over the Minutemen since 2021.

That victory pushed the Arrows (4-3 overall) to their first 4-1 start in OCC play since 2020, putting them firmly in position to make a run at league supremacy with nine conference games to play.

“In the last four or five years, we haven’t beaten Lexington and Senior very much at all, let alone in a matter of five calendar days,” Ashland head coach Jason Hess said after the win over Lex.

“We’re starting to figure some things out, starting to to figure out some rotations,” he added. “… Hopefully we can enjoy (a break from games between Dec. 24 and Jan. 1), get healthy, get everyone’s legs underneath them a little bit and then get ready to go through the grind in January and February.”

Without question, the OCC has found itself in the midst of one of its most unpredictable seasons ever.

Through Sunday, here’s how the conference lays out:

7-1, 5-0 / Dover (close league wins by 6, 5, 4, 3)

4-3, 4-1 / Ashland (close league wins by 5, 2)

6-2, 3-2 / Mansfield Senior

4-3, 2-2 / Lexington (beat Senior by 2)

5-3, 2-3 / New Philadelphia

4-4, 2-3 / Wooster (beat New Philly by 1 in OT)

3-5, 1-4 / West Holmes (beat Madison by 4)

0-5, 0-4 / Madison

The four teams at the top of the race all feature variables that make the OCC fraught with uncertainty.

League-leading Dover is in its first season in the conference and has survived with wins by six, five, four and three points in four of its OCC wins.

The conference’s unfamiliarity with the Tornadoes already seems to have paid early dividends, as they have leaned on defense to settle in (just 39.2 ppg allowed in OCC contests).

If not for two losses by a combined seven points to Ashland and Lex in a four-day stretch, Mansfield Senior would be a perfect 8-0 this season.

Two of the Tygers’ top scorers against the Arrows – Davion Mack and D.J. Corbin – were with other programs a year ago, and the squad graduated last season’s OCC Player of the Year, Kyevi Roane.

Lexington, meanwhile, entered the campaign missing three All-OCC players from last year who could have played this winter. Instead, the senior trio is committed to compete at the Division I college level in other sports, including Joe Caudill (Michigan State football), Brayden Fogle (Georgia football) and Latrell Hughes (interest from Oregon track, among others).

Add in the Arrows, who are without former all-league post Nathan Bernhard – graduating early to begin his football career at the University of Maryland – and the OCC has an up-for-grabs aura that would give Vegas bettors nightmares.

“Some of the teams that I thought were gonna be at the top are now sitting there with two or three losses,” Hess said. “Then you add in Dover, who is kind of unfamiliar to everybody, that definitely changes the dynamics a little bit.

“It will be really interesting here from January on, which teams kind of jell together and which teams figure it out. I think it’s really one of those years where anybody can beat anybody else.”

Ashland forced its way into the conversation before Christmas.

Staring at a potential 2-5 overall start to the season, the Arrows turned in critical fourth-quarter efforts against both Mansfield Senior and Lexington to close out their 2025 with a 4-3 mark instead.

Against the Tygers, Ashland had an early 5-4 lead, then trailed nearly the rest of the way before Ediger helped drag AHS back in front.

The senior guard’s 44 markers surpassed the former Arrow record of 42 held by both Luke Denbow (2022) and Tom Malone (1970), as Ediger tossed in six 3-pointers and was a critical 8-of-9 from the free-throw stripe.

“The OCC is really tight this year and I feel like all the games from here on out, they’re all gonna be tough,” Ediger said after the game. “I’m just happy that we got the win and it was cool to get the record.”

Against Lexington, Ashland got its win in an almost completely opposite style. Ediger played sick and couldn’t find his shot (13 points, 5-of-19 shooting from the field), but senior guards Gabe Baith and Reed Emmons both dropped in 15 points to bump AHS past the Minutemen, 65-63.

Garrett Davis also had 12 points for the Arrows, and Killian O’Brien had the bucket of the night.

After Lexington tied it with 1:08 to play, Ashland held possession the rest of the way, working the ball around before Baith found O’Brien under the basket for a game-winning layup.

The Arrows were behind as much as 50-36 in the third quarter, but made an all-hands-on-deck comeback to snap a six-game losing streak to to LHS.

The Minutemen have won the last two league crowns outright and entered their game against Ashland with a 27-2 record in their previous 29 OCC games.

“When you take a couple of 6-foot-5 Division I (college-bound) athletes out of the middle of their defense (Caudill and Fogle), that changes things a lot because then their guards don’t have that safety net behind them,” Hess said of Lexington.

“We had five guys in double figures and it’s been a while since that has happened. … It was definitely a fun night.”

O’Brien has proven himself a massive addition to the Ashland attack, giving the squad one of the best athletes on the floor every night out.

The junior – who had a second consecutive monster season as a wide receiver in football for the Arrows – was considering not playing basketball, but joined the team after its third game.

He had just five total points before scoring 10 against the Minutemen. His and-1 driving layup in the third quarter keyed a crucial 8-0 third-quarter run for Ashland, and through four games, he’s already tied for the team lead in offensive rebounds (eight).

“We’re glad about the decision he was able to come to and we talked it over with our guys and they welcomed him in,” Hess said. “That’s a credit to our senior leadership and our guys individually, that they care more about the team and they could see how much Killian could help us.

“They were all willing to embrace him and encourage him to come and play.”

But if Ashland is to be in position to win the OCC when the finish line gets near, it will need to lean on the guard play it gets from the perimeter.

Ediger now stands 13^th in program history with 938 points, leaving him 62 away from becoming the ninth 1,000-point scorer at Ashland. He’s made 113 career 3-pointers and is averaging 25.1 points per game this season.

Meanwhile, Baith has 785 career points and 137 career 3-pointers, and Emmons is the squad’s most accurate deep threat at 40 percent from downtown (79-of-200 in his career). He’s scored at least 15 points in three games this season.

“The 3-point shot is such a huge component of our offense; we are looking to make double-digit 3s every night we step on the floor,” Hess said.

“We don’t have an inside scoring threat, other than off the dribble. … Those nights we’re hitting 3s, that opens up the driving lines to get to the basket.”

The Arrows kick off 2026 on Friday at New Philadelphia, where they hope to continue momentum that has them in position to threaten for their first OCC championship since 2022.

“I think we can still play better, and that’s the exciting thing,” Hess said. “I told the guys, we didn’t play our best basketball (against Lexington), but we still found a way to win.

“We’ve got seniors that have been through it, and with the guard play we’ve got, we can handle the basketball and make the right decisions down the stretch.”