RIB LAKE BOYS BASKETBALL - OUT IN FRONT EARLY

RIB LAKE BOYS BASKETBALL

Not only has the Rib Lake boys basketball team stacked together three straight wins, two of them have come on the road in Marawood North play potentially setting them up in a favorable situation as the season progresses.

The second of those big road wins came Tuesday when the Redmen regrouped after Prentice made a late charge and outscored the host Buccaneers 12-2 in the final 4:30 to earn a 6154 victory. Added to wins at Athens and over Abbotsford, the Redmen head into the holidays sitting atop the Marawood North standings at 3-2, a half-game over 2-2 Phillips, who Rib Lake won’t see until Jan. 9. Prentice fell a full game behind at 2-3, which is where Athens, the defending North champion, sits as well.

Not surprisingly the recent surge has come in the three games where the team had all members of its senior core present in the lineup.

“It’s nice to have everybody back and healthy and eligible and playing well,” head coach Todd Henderson said after Friday’s win over Abbotsford. “It’s a fun group with everybody there and all the pieces in place.”

The health part took a hit late in Tuesday’s game when guard Andrew Wudi turned his ankle in a collision with an official with 4:45 left. At the time, Rib Lake trailed 50-49 and, seconds later, Aidan Hause scored inside to give the Bucs a 52-49 lead.

But Rib Lake, who had allowed an 11-point second-half lead to get away, didn’t fold. Instead, the Redmen got aggressive.

First, Dominic Quednow got free in the lane and converted a three-point play to tie the game with 4:05 left. Then, with Rib Lake going back to its man-toman defense, Quednow got a steal and fast-break chance, which he missed, but Jackson Blomberg was there to clean up the rebound and put the Redmen in front with 3:35 to go.

After another stop, Quednow drove the lane and scored for a 56-52 lead with 3:02 left.

A Hause bucket got Prentice within 56-54 with two minutes left, but the Redmen closed it out from there with free throws, defense and rebounding.

The biggest defensive play was a Donovan Sutherland block of Evan Lord’s 3-point try from the right corner. Sutherland recovered the ball before it went out of bounds, got it to Quednow, who found Talon Scheithauer sprinting toward the basket. Scheithauer made one of two free throws with 14.2 seconds left, with Quednow rebounding the miss and adding two free throws with 12.7 seconds left to make it a three-score game.

After scoring the game’s first four points, Prentice found itself chasing Rib Lake the rest of the way.

Blomberg scored eight straight points, including two 3s, to the push the Redmen to an early 15-6 lead. As the fast-paced first half progressed, the Bucs got within 24-20 on two Hagan Isaacson free throws with 5:35 left. Rib Lake went on a 6-0 spurt with Wudi’s assist to Sutherland, a perfect Scheithauer assist to a cutting Michael Butler and a Wudi steal that led to a Quednow score and a 30-20 lead. with 4:06 left. Prentice went on a run to get within 32-29, but Blomberg’s baseline drive with 20 seconds left made it 35-29 at the half.

Scheithauer’s 3 gave Rib Lake its largest lead at 40-29, but an 11-0 Prentice run, capped by 3s from Lord and Isaacson, tied it. Rib Lake answered with an 6-0 run. Jed Henderson drove and scored, Sutherland kept working and scored on his third shot and Wudi grabbed a defensive rebound and hit Seth Borchardt with a long outlet pass. The Bucs finally caught Rib Lake, taking a 49-48 lead on Lord’s 3 with just over eight minutes left.

While Prentice outscored Rib Lake from the 3-point (21-9) and free throw (1310) lines, Rib Lake got the win by doing what it does best, offensively. The Redmen turned 19 Prentice turnovers into 19 points and, when patient offensively, the Redmen were able to score inside, making 21 of 42 two-point shots and scoring 42 points in the paint.

Quednow scored 16 points and Blomberg added 15 to lead Rib Lake, who is now 6-2 overall. Sutherland scored eight, while Wudi and Scheithauer added seven apiece. Henderson scored four points in the win, while Butler and Borchardt added two each.

While Rib Lake was outrebounded 3835, the Redmen got several big rebounds late. Henderson and Sutherland led Rib Lake with seven boards each, while Quednow and Blomberg had six each and Scheithauer had four. Wudi dished out eight assists before exiting. Quednow had eight defensive deflections and three steals. Blomberg also had three steals.

Isaacson, a freshman, led Prentice with 19 points, while Lord, a sophomore, scored 18. Hause had a 10-point, 19-rebound double-double.

Rib Lake is off until Dec. 28 when it hosts the 6-0 Florence Bobcats in an intriguing 4:15 p.m. non-conference game.

On Friday, Rib Lake broke down Abbotsford’s defense with patience to get good looks in the paint and turned 22 Falcon turnovers into 24 points and a fair share of transition baskets in a 66-40 blowout.

Rib Lake scored the game’s first eight points and led 20-5 midway through the first half. From there, the outcome was never in doubt. The Redmen led by as many as 34 in the second half while pulling even with their Marawood record at 2-2.

“I thought our guys played hard and hustled well and did a good job on defense,” Todd Henderson said. “They were just working hard, getting some deflections, getting in the passing lanes. Then we were able to turn the defense into offense. That’s always kinda fun. We struggled a little bit in the first half because we’d get a steal and then turn the ball over again. But overall I thought we did a good job of keeping the pressure on.”

Rib Lake went with its 1-3-1 zone for most of the night. The Redmen’s length on the top got the brunt of the defense’s 18 steals and 11 deflections. Abbotsford hit just six of 21 3-point shots and was just 14 of 53 from the field overall.

“We talked about that with the guys even during the last game down at Athens (a 69-49 win),” Henderson said. “We got down, then we went to the 1-3-1 and kinda got back into it before halftime. Then in the second half we just stayed man and we built the lead. We have to be able to get turnovers and get back into the game, whether it’s zone or man. We can’t just rely on one or the other. We have to be able to play both well.”

Blomberg’s 3 was followed by a Sutherland basket and then a Scheithauer steal that led to a three-point play for Quednow and an 8-0 lead 3:26 in. Jed Henderson got a putback, Wudi’s steal led to a Sutherland score, Sutherland scored again and Wudi got a basket to push the lead to 15. After Abbotsford pulled within 22-10, the Redmen went on another key 8-0 run that included a couple of transition baskets by Sutherland to extend the lead to 20.

Falcon Payton Schreiber banked in a 3-pointer in the final minute to bring Abbotsford within 36-21, but Borchardt answered that with a big hit from the left corner for a 3 that made it 39-21 at the half.

Rib Lake held Abbotsford without a field goal for the first 10-plus minutes of the half, while building a 58-24 lead. It was 66-32 when the Falcons finished the game with an 8-0 spurt.

Blomberg led three Redmen in double figures with 16 points. Quednow had 15 and Sutherland added 13. Henderson had six points and 10 rebounds. Wudi had six points and six rebounds. Borchardt had five points and five boards. Scheithauer had four points and six rebounds. Corey Fuchs had a point and two rebounds late in the game. Quednow had six of Rib Lake’s steals, Sutherland had four and Wudi had three.

Scheithauer had three of Rib Lake’s 10 assists. Wudi and Quednow had two each.

“It’s fun when you play good unselfish basketball,” Todd Henderson said. “The guys are looking for other guys and trying to get them to score. They’re passing ahead and finding the open man.”

Schreiber scored 11 points to lead the Falcons, while Irvin Aguilera added seven points and four rebounds.

Michael Butler gets in the passing lane and gets the steal, leading to a basket for Jackson Blomberg during the second half of Rib Lake’s 66-40 win over Abbotsford. MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS