Athens hits Rib Lake hard early in D5 girls regional opener

WIAA DIV. 5 GIRLS BASKETBALL

The Rib Lake girls basketball team went into its Feb. 21 WIAA Division 5 regional opener with a hint of confidence, knowing it had played third-seeded Athens tough in the teams’ last meeting on Jan. 26.

The Blue Jays, though, hit Rib Lake with a quick punch that put this one away in a hurry.

In less than four minutes, Rib Lake was down 16-2 and with its limited firepower that was a hole it wasn’t going to dig out of in a 63-29 loss to their North rivals, who improved to 22-3 at the time. Athens beat Columbus Catholic 50-31 before losing 56-47 in the regional final Saturday at second-seeded Edgar.

Though Athens cooled off and finished with a 42.1% shooting percentage for the night, the Blue Jays won this one by knocking down 14 of 30 shots in the first half alone, including six of 13 3-point attempts.

Rib Lake got back on its feet after that first punch and played fairly even with the Jays for the rest of the first half, but the Redmen went scoreless in the first six minutes of the second half, which assured they’d finish their first year under head coach Joe Treffinger at 3-21.

Addison Lavicka and Celina Ellenbecker hit 3s on Athens’ first two possessions and Jazelle Hartwig got a putback for an 8-0 lead just 84 seconds into the game. Josie Scheithauer drove and scored to get Rib Lake on the board, but then Athens got a three-point play from Sophia Coker, a bucket and a free throw seconds later from Hartwig and another score form Coker. Lavicka’s 3 would make it 19-3 with just 4:30 elapsed.

Before the half expired, Rib Lake had some highlights, including an outside shot from Addison Gumz, a Madilyn Blomberg score in transition off a Gumz assist and four points from Kiana Dallmann with one basket coming when she grabbed a defensive rebound and outraced the defense to the other end and her second one coming on a steal. Athens led 39-17 at the half.

It was 51-17 before Gumz scored on a left baseline drive to start the second half.

Dallmann hit a baseline jumper later in the half to tie her season-high of six points.

Scheithauer led Rib Lake with 11 points and she had three rebounds. Dallmann had four rebounds to go with her six points. Gumz finished with five points and four rebounds.

Blomberg and Emma Tlusty had two points each and Avery Niemi scored three points and had seven rebounds and two steals. Tahlia Scheithauer led Rib Lake with three assists.

Athens put four players in double figures in scoring, led by Coker’s 18 points and 12 rebounds. Lavicka had 17 points, six rebounds and six assists. Hartwig had a strong all-around game as well with 13 points, six rebounds, five assists and four steals. Ellenbecker had 12 points.

Rib Lake hung with the taller Athens squad, getting outrebounded only by a 37-33 margin. The Redmen were hurt by 27 turnovers, which led to 23 points for Athens. The Redmen made 10 of 47 shots from the field (21.3%) and were eight of 14 from the free throw line.

Rib Lake’s lone loss to graduation at the varsity level will be Kamryn Annala, who was among the team leaders in scoring and rebounding. The rest of the roster could return, including Scheithauer as a senior leader. With five freshmen getting significant playing time this year and another, Tessa Weik, returning from injury, the Redmen hope the pieces are in place to start an upward climb next season.