March 28, 2024

CMB boys pull away from pesky Tigerhawks

BAXTER — Collins-Maxwell/Baxter boys basketball coach Scott Brummel hasn’t played man-to-man defense very often this season. It just doesn’t fit his personnel.

But when the game was too close for comfort and Brummel needed a spark, the man-to-man defense was there to light the fire.

And a 25-8 advantage in the fourth quarter allowed the Raiders to pull away from a pesky Colfax-Mingo squad and record a 57-37 win in a game that was much closer than the score indicates.

The Tigerhawks trailed by just three after three quarters and a Jacob Lietz layup early in the fourth quarter kept the visitors within striking distance. CMB, though, used an 11-5 run to pull away for good.

“It’s one of those matchups where both teams play zone so it can be kind of slow,” Brummel said. “That’s one of the reasons why we decided to play man in the fourth. We don’t play a lot of it, but I thought that bumped the tempo up just enough that we got enough separation.

“It’s kind of one of those nights where you just get your lunch pail and put in your time. I am not pleased by any means, but we made enough plays to get a win.”

The win was CMB’s fifth in the past seven games and it came on a night when the team recognized its eight seniors before the game.

Two of those seniors — Bryce Kemp and Seth Balke — each scored in double figures to lead the way for CMB, which is now 8-9 overall and 7-8 in Heart of Iowa Athletic Conference play.

And Kemp was anxious to get back on the court after the Raiders let a late lead slip away from them against South Hamilton on Friday night.

“It left a bad taste in our mouth. We shouldn’t have lost that game, and I wanted to get back on the court tonight and help us redeem ourselves from that one,” said Kemp, who finished with a game-high 16 points and 10 rebounds.

Kemp helped get the Raiders off to a solid start. He scored seven points in the opening frame and CMB led 18-8 after one.

But Colfax-Mingo remained in the game thanks to solid play by Colin Lourens and Lietz. Lietz scored four of the Tigerhawks’ first six points of the second frame and a Lourens bucket inside trimmed the deficit to four before Kemp pushed it back to six at halftime.

Lourens and Lietz continued to make sure Colfax-Mingo (0-16, 0-15) stayed in the game. The junior duo scored back-to-back buckets to begin the third to trim the Raider lead to 22-20.

CMB scored the next seven points though, including a dunk from Kemp on which he was fouled and he sank the free throw.

However, Lourens went right back to work, scoring five more points and keeping the margin within reach.

The fourth quarter belonged to the Raiders though. After an 11-5 run pushed the CMB lead to nine, Joey Nissen buried his only bucket of the game from long range to finish off the Tigerhawks.

“Halfway through the fourth quarter we have a shot to win the game and then it ends up a 20-point margin,” Colfax-Mingo coach John Borts said. “We just make a lot of mistakes on both ends of the court at the end of the game. We gave up a lot of easy opportunities. I can’t tell you what it is, we have a lot of these kind of games. We just can’t finish.”

Brummel thought switching to a man-to-man defense was the key in his team finally being able to shake away from a Tigerhawk squad who is hungry to claim their first win.

“It allowed us to get after it a little bit and kind of create a tempo that is more suitable for our team,” Brummel said. “Our execution on offense was also much better in the fourth.”

Brummel was able to dig into his bench late in the game. And the ones still playing on the court when the buzzer sounded were five of the Raiders’ eight seniors.

“The best part about this group of seniors is that they look out for each other,” Brummel said. “They reminded me late in the game to make sure I got all of the seniors in.”

Balke complimented Kemp’s double-double with 10 points, five assists, three steals and eight rebounds. Kemp also had five assists and three steals and Brady Stover collected nine points. Two other seniors — Tommy Galloway and Patrick Girard — added eight and seven points, respectively.

Lourens led the Tigerhawks with 16 points and 10 boards, while Lietz added six points, five rebounds and five assists.

Notebook

CMB’s eight seniors include Kemp, Balke, Girard, Galloway, Nissen, Kyle Cather, Mark Deutsch and Colin Thomson. Deutsch brought the crowd to their feet in the final seconds when buried a 3-pointer to put the Raiders up 20. … CMB travels to Roland-Story on Friday, while Colfax-Mingo heads to Saydel. Both games are scheduled to tip off at 7:30 p.m.

Colfax-Mingo 8-8-13-8—37
CMB 18-4-10-25—57
Colfax-Mingo (FG/3pt) — Myers 2-1-4-5, Summy 1-0-0-2, Lietz 4-0-3-8, Lourens 7-2-4-16, Nichols 2-0-5-4, Deal 1-0-0-2. TOTALS 17-3-18-37.
CMB (FG/3pt) — Galloway 2-4-5-8, Balke 2-6-4-10, Kemp 7/1-1-2-16, Stover 4-1-0-9, Girard 3-0-1-0-7, Cather 0-1-0-1, Deutsch 1/1-0-0-3, Nissen 1/1-0-2-3, Thomson 0-0-1-0, Gunderson 0-0-2-0. TOTALS 20/314-15-57.