Friday, December 22, 2006

Strong effort falls short for Wolverines

Century pulls out 50-40 win in Hailey


By

Wolverine center Erik Jacobson drives for the bucket in Wednesday?s game against the Century Diamondbacks. Jacobson scored 14 points for Wood River in the 50-40 loss. Photo by David N. Seelig

Entering Wednesday night's home clash with the Century Diamondbacks, Wood River boys' basketball head coach John Radford knew the Wolverines needed an emotional and energetic effort from his cagers to pull off an upset in Hailey.

For three-and-a-half periods, the Wolverines gave him just that, but they eventually dropped a 50-40 decision to the #4-ranked 4A Century (6-1) from Pocatello.

"We just ran out of gas there at the end," Radford said, in his first campaign heading up the Wood River varsity bench. "But the team did a great job. They played with such a great effort and I told them how proud I was."

Free throw shooting down the stretch also hurt the Wolverines (3-5, 2-2 at home), as they only converted 4 of 14 attempts after halftime and finished 7-for-18 from the charity stripe. Century hit 16 of 20 free throws in sweeping the season series.

The score was tied 23-23 at halftime and the Wolverines kept the game close in the third period.

They tied it again 29-29 with three minutes remaining on a fast break lay-up from junior guard Ross Parsons (8 points, 3 assists). But Century was able to slow down the tempo in the fourth, jumping into a 2-3 zone and taking Wood River completely out of rhythm offensively.

Leading the way for the home team was athletic senior wing Cory Rutkowski, who had a spirited first half with 10 points.

More important than his scoring, Rutkowski contributed a strong defensive effort on Century's star guard, junior Kyle Miller-Whaley (10 points, 19.7 ppg season), who struggled getting his shot off against Rutkowski's swarming defense.

"Cory is a good defender and we focused on shutting him (Miller-Whaley) down. Cory did a great job for us tonight," Radford said.

The second half belonged to the inside work of Wood River's Erik Jacobson (14 points, 9 in the second half, 8 rebounds) and Century's 6-2 senior forward Jordan Craney (13 points, all in the second half).

Jacobson, Wood River's 6-5 junior workhorse under the basket, tied the game up early in the fourth period at 35-35 with a slick post move inside. But a 15-5 Century run after that score put the game out of reach.

Wood River's versatile junior Matt Staskiewicz (3 points, 5 rebounds, 2 steals, 2 assists) had an effective game. Overall, Wood River was out-rebounded 19-18. Century's 6-4 senior Mason Clinger (16 points, 6 rebounds) was game-high scorer.

The Wolverines take a two-week break for the holiday, returning to the Hailey home court on Friday, Jan. 5, against Challis, the highly-regarded 2A squad that edged the Wolverines by nine points just six days ago.




 Local Weather 
Search archives:


Copyright © 2024 Express Publishing Inc.   Terms of Use   Privacy Policy
All Rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of Express Publishing Inc. is prohibited. 

The Idaho Mountain Express is distributed free to residents and guests throughout the Sun Valley, Idaho resort area community. Subscribers to the Idaho Mountain Express will read these stories and others in this week's issue.