Hawks turn away Plainsmen in 1A regional semifinal

SULLY — Man-to-man defense is their stock and trade, but Lynnville-Sully’s girls switched to a zone defense in their Class 1A Region 5 semifinal game Friday at home against Belle Plaine.

The zone defense served the 10th-ranked Hawks well.

“I don’t like to play the zone a whole lot, but we do have it. We needed to pull it out because we were in a little foul trouble. It kind of slowed them (Belle Plaine) down,” said Jerry Hulsing, Hawk head coach, following his team’s 65-47 win.

“We rebounded the ball out of the zone and got out and starting running.”

Lynnville-Sully had defeated the Plainsmen twice in South Iowa Cedar League play during the regular season. The Hawks weren’t taking anything for granted.

“Tonight, we came out to play — ready to play them specifically,” Senior Madison Rasmusson said. “Both teams wanted to win. It’s a regional game. But we pushed through it tonight and wanted to win more.”

With the victory at home Friday, the Hawk girls are one win way from a second-straight trip to the Iowa Class 1A State Girls’ Basketball Tournament, March 2-6, at Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines.

Standing in their way are the 11th-ranked Springville Orioles, who defeated Marquette Catholic, 51-35, on Friday.

Lynnville-Sully (22-1) and Springville (20-3) play Monday at 7 p.m. at Iowa City West High School. It is an unfamiliar venue for the Hawks.

“It’s a basketball court with the same dimensions as our home court,” Hulsing said. “We’re just going to take our show on the road and see what happens. We’ll be ready to go Monday.”

The Hawks had to handle Belle Plaine to get to the regional championship game. The game between the two SICL teams was quick and intense from the tip-off.

Lynnville-Sully senior Lysandra James got the first basket inside then Belle Plaine fired in five consecutive points starting with a 3-pointer by Emilee Bean.

A putback basket by sophomore Brenna Lanser for the Hawks made it 5-4 then James used another offensive rebound to score. James was fouled and completed the three-point play from the free-throw line.

The Hawks got out to a 14-8 lead on a 3-pointer by Lanser with 1:45 left in the first quarter. Belle Plaine scored the final five points of the period to get within one point, 16-15.

Both teams were dealing with foul troubles by the end of the first quarter.

The second period opened with three consecutive 3-pointers. Belle Plaine’s Morgan Straight hit the first one and was quickly answered with a trey from Rasmusson. Makenzie O’Brien put the Plainsmen up 21-19 on a 3-pointer.

Lynnville-Sully went inside to James for two to tie the game. Kasiah Ehresman drove the length of the court and right to the basket for a go-ahead bucket for the Hawks with 6:18 on the clock.

Lynnville-Sully was up by one, 24-23, when Rasmusson drained a 3-pointer. James sank both ends of a one-and-one. Belle Plaine countered with three straight points.

The Hawks established control for good with a 7-0 run in the final three minutes of the first half followed by an 8-0 surge to open the third quarter. Lynnville-Sully extended its halftime lead of 36-26 to 44-26 by the 3:34 mark of the third period.

“We scored on a couple of quick trips and we got stops. We focused on that a lot this week — score and stop, score and stop,” Hulsing said. “We wanted to lock it down, get a lead, finish it off and go build on it.”

The Hawks outscored the Plainsmen 32-18 in the second and third quarters. They were up 48-33 heading into the final eight minutes.

Marissa Vos scored and was fouled with 5:32 remaining in the game. She missed the free throw, but 15 seconds later, James had a three-point play to push the Hawks to a 57-40 lead.

James, who had a game-high 20 points, scored on a fastbreak for Lynnville-Sully at the 4:58 mark. There was no comeback for Belle Plaine.

“Yes, it was good that they pushed us tonight. I think it will help us keep going,” Rasmusson said. “We had been push a little bit this season. We matched them well tonight and they shot it really well, but we came right back at them.”

Rasmusson hit three 3-pointers in the game finished with 15 points. She also had five of the team’s 10 steals and six of the Hawks’ 13 assists.

Vos had a double-double with 12 points and 11 rebounds. Lanser had a double-double also with 10 points and 16 rebounds.

Lynnville-Sully shot 40 percent, 25-of-63, from the field while Belle Plaine went 16-of-49 for 33 percent. The Hawks cashed in 11-of-15 free throw attempts and the Plainsmen were 10-of-15 at the line.

Straight led the Plainsmen with 14 points, five steals and seven assists. Marisa Pope had 11 points and 10 rebounds. O’Brien had 10 points.

Belle Plaine  15-11-7-14—47

Lynnville-Sully  16-20-12-17—65

Lynnville-Sully (FG/3-pt): James 7-6-1-20, Rasmusson 2/3-2-1-15, Vos 6-0-3-12, Lanser 3/1-1-3-10, Davis 1-0-4-2, Ehresman 2-2-2-6, Rozendaal 0-0-3-0. TOTALS: 21/4-11-17-65.

Belle Plaine (FG/3-pt): Straight 2/2-4-1-14, Pope 4-3-3-11, O’Brien 2/2-0-2-10, Ward 0-0-1-0, Bean 0/1-2-4-5, Montgomery 3-1-4-7, Anderson 0-0-1-0, Willett 0-0-1-0. TOTALS: 11/5-10-17-47.

Contact Jocelyn Sheets at
641-792-3121 ext. 6535 or jsheets@newtondailynews.com