By Mark Schafer | The News-Review
KEOTA – There’s no place like home, and for the Keota basketball teams that was exactly the case last Tuesday.
Both the Keota girls and boys teams were able to walkaway with lopsided wins in the Dec. 2 contest against Belle Plaine. The Keota girls kicked things off with a 66-22 victory. Meanwhile the Eagle boys were able to win 62-29.
In the girls game a lot of it just seemed to be all about a matter of time. Early on the Keota defense figured out they could get steals, but the steals didn’t always lead to points.
“One of the things we talk about is being aggressive on both sides of the floor. We wanted to set the tone early on and I thought Elyse Lyle was able to come out and play really, really sound defense,” said Keota girls head basketball coach, Jeff Sprouse. “She didn’t let her player do anything, especially once we switched to a three-quarter court defense. From there we were able to get Cameron (Haifley) involved too.”
When the Eagles were able to put pressure on the Belle Plaine offense, good things seemed to happen.
Either Lyle or Haifley were able to get a steal that led to a scoring opportunity for the Eagles, or the Belle Plaine offense would panic and try to get their offense going a lot quicker than they wanted.
When either of those things happened it wasn’t long until the Eagles would get the ball back and take control of the game.
Throughout the first half the Eagles were able to use their defense to fuel the offense. By halftime they were able to lead 31-8, but that score was hampered by some shots of Keota that continued to roll out of the rim.
By the second half the Eagles were able to slow themselves down on offense just enough to get the ball to fall through the hoop more readily.
“We missed some easy shots early on, we have to make those shots, but I think we were just a little rusty because we hadn’t practiced in about eight days,” Sprouse said. “Once we got that rust off we started to really show what we’re capable of.”
With the defense and offense starting to play to their full potential in the second half the Eagles started to soar over Belle Plaine.
In the second half the Eagles scored 35 points while holding the Plainsmen to just 14. That allowed the Eagles to take a relatively easy 66-22 victory.
Leading the way for the Eagles in scoring was Jessalyn Aller who finished with 16 points. She also had six rebounds.
Haifley added another 14 points. Kennedy Jackson added 12 points in the win. Emily Conger and Dakota Dodd both scored five points each. Another five points were turned in by Brynn Conrad.
Karley Greiner scored four points. Adyson Ahlberg finished with three points. Lyle added two points.
While scoring was something that held the girls back in the first half of their game, the boys didn’t have the same problem.
Keota bested Belle Plaine 62-29, with the help of 35 points scored in the first half.
At the start of the game the two strongest players for the Eagles seemed to be Jackson Vittetoe and Blake Baker. If it wasn’t one player scoring, the other seemed to be able to pick up the rebound and add the score.
Throughout the first half the combination of Baker’s high energy, lane charging ability and Vittetoe’s ability to shoot the long shots helped the Eagles take a large lead. When they weren’t on offense the Eagles were able to out rebound Belle Plaine, shutting down any ability of the Plainesmen to get a second chance shot up.
With the large, 35-12, halftime lead the second half featured an accelerated clock. It wasn’t long before both teams were substituting in their younger players to finish out the game.
Baker would lead the scoring for the Eagles with 18 total points. Porter Cave added 16 points in the season-opening win. Vittetoe finished with 15 points. Brennan McGuire added eight points. Another five points came from Ayden Galindo. Galindo also added 11 rebounds.
The wins continued for Keota on Dec. 5 as both teams picked up a victory over HLV-TC.
In the girls game the Eagles used a 23-point second quarter to propel them to a 57-31 victory.
Cameron Haifley would finish with 24 total points in that game. Emily Conger scored 15 points. Another 11 points came from Elyse Lyle.
The boys game was a 62-45 victory. The Eagles led by one point after the first quarter, and only continued to build on their lead for the rest of the contest.
Vittetoe led the team with 21 points and 14 rebounds. Chase Haifley added 15 points. McGuire, Cave and Galindo all finished with eight points each. Blake Baker added two points.
This week the Eagles host Colfax-Mingo and Sigourney.
Photos by Mark Schafer
