Elk Mound boys use long ball to pull of win over Colfax

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by Marlys Kruger

Sports Correspondent

ELK MOUND — It was “Bombs Away” for both the Elk Mound and Colfax basketball teams when the Vikings invaded the Mounder gym last Thursday night, January 12. The teams combined for 24 triples on the night but the 14 made by the Mounders made the big difference in the game as they pulled out a 69-51 win over the Vikings.

It was like old times with the game being played in front of a full house and it couldn’t have started any better for Elk Mound or any worse for Colfax. 

The Mounders connected on four triples in the first few minutes starting with Kaden Russo, followed by Cale Knutson and two more from Russo while the Vikings scored from the paint on buckets from Elijah Entzminger and Jack Scharlau making it 12-4 for the Mounders. Ryan Bartig scored on an old-fashioned three pointer with a deuce and a free throw but Aiden Fischer showed the fans the Vikings could hit the long shots too with his own trey. Logan Jerome brought the Elk Mound crowd to their feet with a slam dunk for a 17-7 advantage and after Fischer drained 2-of-3 free tosses after being fouled behind the arc, Russo canned another trey to increase the Mounder advantage to 20-9. 

Knutson scored on a put back before Entzminger drilled a trey, and the triples kept falling for Elk Mound as Knutson connected on back-to-back long balls to up the Mounder lead to 28-12. Entzminger swiped the ball and drove in for a layup and Nick Jensen scored in the lane on a baby hook shot to get Colfax closer at 28-16 but those points were matched by Knutson and Aiden Bartholomew for a 32-16 Mounder advantage.

But the 16-point deficit didn’t deter the Vikings as they scored the final 11 points of the half. Entzminger got the ball rolling with a short jumper, Scharlau drained a trey and Fischer canned another one, and after the Vikings forced a Mounder turnover, Fischer stayed in the zone and drained another triple. Elk Mound held the ball for a final shot with around 30 seconds left, but they couldn’t get a shot off as the half ended with them up just 32-27.

“Tonight we shot the ball very well,” Elk Mound coach Chris Hahn said.

“Colfax was doubling Sam (Wenzel)  all night, sometimes even before he caught the ball. That left a few of our shooters open, and to our kids credit, we found the open man and they knocked down the shots. We did not finish the end of the half well as Colfax did a nice job with their 11 point run to end the half,” he added.

After a Russo free throw to start the second stanza, Colfax closed the gap to three points with a Scharlau triple bringing the score to 33-30 for the Mounders. But the hot shooting from long range continued as Russo and Knutson each drilled another trey before Scharlau halted the short streak with a free toss. Bartig canned his own freebie and decided to get into the three-point action with one of his own to up the Elk Mound lead to 43-31. Colfax scored six points on three shots in the paint, two by Scharlau and another by Kyle Irwin who was pretty well swarmed by the Mounder defense to bring the Vikings back to within six, down 43-37

But every time the Vikings pulled closer, the Mounders, using a zone defense most of the game, wouldn’t allow them to go on any long scoring runs and they seemed to counter with points of their own. Jerome scored from close range and Russo hit a deuce and tacked on a free throw for a 48-37 Mounder advantage with around 10 minutes to play.

After Scharlau scored in the lane, Russo canned his sixth and final trey of the game and Wenzel scored his first points of the contest to up the advantage at 53-40, but Fischer wasn’t done yet as he drilled another trey. And once again, the Mounders responded with a Knutson free toss and back-to-back shots from beyond the arc by Bartig and Jerome and the Mounders had their biggest lead of the game at 60-43. 

The Vikings made another run on a corner three pointer from Scharlau, a put back by Jensen and Fischer’s fifth trey on the night and suddenly the Mounder lead had shrunk to 60-51. The Vikings, however, had six team fouls, and using a full court press, didn’t want to foul and put the sharp shooting Mounders to the charity stripe. Elk Mound broke the press and found an open Jerome under the basket, and after the Vikings missed two shots, Bartig hit another triple to make it 65-51. Colfax committed that seventh foul with 2:46 to go and Elk Mound finished off the scoring with a pair of free tosses by both Russo and Bartig.

“When Elk Mound made 14 threes it was hard to overcome that kind of shooting,” Colfax coach Mark Noll said after the disappointing loss. “I give credit to them for having that kind of a shooting night,” he added.

Russo doubled his scoring average with a game high 24 points for the night which included 6-for-11 from three-point land and 4-of-5 free throws, and snared seven rebounds. Knutson was five points over his average, ending with 17 points on 4-of-9 from long range and collected six assists, Bartig was also above his 12-point average with 15 points, nailing all three of his three-point attempts and going 4-for-5 at the charity stripe and Jerome added nine points and five rebounds. All told, the Mounders were 9-for-13 in free throws and 14-for-25 on those shots from behind the arc.

Colfax was led by Scharlau with 19 points which included four triples and Fischer scored yet another career high with 17 points with five treys. Entzminger added nine points in the contest and the Vikings were good on 3-of-7 free tosses.

“This was an important win for us because Colfax has been playing teams extremely well this year,” coach Hahn said. “We didn’t guard Scharlau very well in the second half and he continued to hit big shots. We need to do a better job of rotating to open shooters in our upcoming games because if we don’t shoot as well as we did tonight, it very easily could be a different outcome. I was proud of our effort tonight,” he concluded.