Lady Toppers drop both tourney games

By Kelsie Hoitomt

GLENWOOD CITY — There would be no gifts for the Glenwood City girls’ basketball team at its own holiday tournament last week.

The Lady Toppers dropped both of its contests; suffering a 54-46 setback to Chippewa Falls McDonell on Thursday night, December 27 and then fell hard the next night (Dec. 28) to the Blackhawks of Baldwin-Woodville, 76-51. The Toppers dropped to 4-4 on the season with the losses.

Toppers fall short against Macks

The annual holiday tournament started off on the wrong foot for the Lady Topper’s Thursday night as they lost their first game to McDonell Central 46-54.

The Topper’s haven’t played a game in over a week and that showed as they appeared to be rusty on their shooting and less aggressive at rebounds.

The first half of the game wasn’t much of a performance as the Topper’s scored just 14 points in the first half of the game. The Mack’s were ahead with 25 points.

The half time break was effective for the Topper’s as they came back with more fire under their shoes as they scored 18 points in the third quarter which put the score at 32-31.

The Topper’s got their first lead of the game in the third quarter after Kelsie Knops sunk two free throws and then drained a lay up.

The Topper’s continued to play more upbeat into the final quarter with 14 points scored, but this was not enough as they allowed the Macks to rack up 23 points, 15 of which were foul shots.

The Mack’s were over 80 percent at the foul line as they were successful with 24 free throws out of 29. The Topper’s on the other hand were just over 60 percent from the line with 12 out of 19 shots made.

The leading shooters for the Hilltopper’s from under the net were Janessa Ullom and Rachel Klatt who each had ten points.

Also scoring was Morgan Kadinger who shined through in the second half as she played aggressively under the net to score eight points for the Hilltoppers.

Moriah Kuehndorf scored six points, Jennifer Kopacz had five points, Kelsie Knops had four points and Olivia Weidling had three points.

B-W blows by Toppers 

Friday night’s game against the Baldwin-Woodville Blackhawks was just as disappointing for the Hilltopper’s as they lost 76-51.

It quickly became a game of foul shots instead of steady play. The Topper’s took 30 foul attempts and the Blackhawks had 27 attempts.

The Topper’s however struggled at the line as they only made 14 free throws compared to the Blackhawks who sunk 20 of their attempts.

The Topper’s led the first quarter by a point of 13-12, but that changed rather quickly in the second quarter as the Blackhawks ran the floor to take a 33-22 into intermission.

Baldwin-Woodville would extend the advantage to 57-38 by the end of the third quarter despite the Toppers best offensive output of the game. Glenwood City put up 16 points in the third quarter only to see it squashed as the Blackhawks managed to tally 24 points.

Maddie Kulow led the Blackhawks and all scorers with 24 point game followed Heidi Hinz and Alyssa Nilssen with 14 points each.

The Topper’s leading scorer in the game was Moriah Kuehndorf with 13 points that included four deuces, a triple and made two-for-two at the line.

The Hilltoppers also got scoring support from was Ullom, who had 11 points, Knops finished with nine points, Kadinger and Klatt each had seven points, Kopacz tallied three, and Mackenzie Wink scored a point.

Glenwood City will have a tough task to open the new year as it will play at conference-leader Colfax Thursday, January 3. The girls will then host Prairie Farm on Monday, January 7 before playing in Boyceville the next night.