GARRISON, ROLFS, LAFFERTY LEAD LITTLE RIVER

HOBSON, STUCKY TOP ELYRIA

By William

LITTLE RIVER – A big third quarter powered the Little River boys to a successful close to the regular season by beating Elyria Christian 52-32 at home on Thursday.

After holding a slim, one-point lead at the end of the first quarter, the Redskins still only held a four point, 26-22, advantage over the Eagles as the teams hit the halftime break. Coming out in the second half, Little River put up 19 points in the third quarter while holding Elyria to just six to take a more commanding 17-point, 45-28 lead into the final eight minutes of play where they cruised in for the final 20-point victory.

“This was a good game for us to end the regular season,” noted Elyria head coach Zach Goodrich. “Little River is a great team and there is not much room for error when you play them. We needed this game and I believe at the end of the day it will help us. I felt we were really good in some areas that we have been working on and hope that will show next week in our first game of substate.”

For Little River, they were led by Jayden Garrison who put up 18 points, including three three-pointers while also dishing out four assists, grabbing four rebounds and making four steals on defense. Both Trey Rolfs and Braxton Lafferty chipped in with 10 points while Rolfs led the team in both rebounds with seven and steals with four.

Little River hit for a solid 55% of their shots from the field while making nine total steals and forcing the Eagles into making 16 turnovers.

For the Eagles, no player reached double figures in scoring though Josef Hobson came close with eight and Zach Stucky had six. Stucky directed the offense and recorded five assists while six Eagles recorded two or three rebounds to make it a team effort in the paint.

Eagle coach Goodrich concluded his post-game reflections by saying, “Zach (Stucky), Josef (Hobson), and Ben (Unruh) did a solid job handling the pressure early in the first half. The last time we played Little reiver we had 20-plus turnovers, tonight we ended up with just 16. It is more than I would like but we will take the improvement and continue to get better. Overall, I was pleased with our effort and look forward to getting back to practice as we prepare for next week at substate.”

The Eagles, now 10-9 for the season, will have a first game bye in the Class 1A Division II substate playoffs, so they will not play until Friday, March 5 when they play the winner of the game between Hartford and Chase.

Little River remains ranked number one in the state and closes the regular season with a sparkling 19-1 record. The Redskins also have a bye in the first round of the Class 1A Division I substate playoffs and will be back on the court on Friday, March 5 when they play the winner of the game between Goessel and Canton/Galva.

ELYRIA CHRISTIAN EAGLES at LITTLE RIVER REDSKINS

SCORING:     Q1      Q2      Q3      Q4      FINAL

EAGLES          16       6          6          4          32

REDSKINS      17       9          19       7          52

ELYRIA CHRISTIAN EAGLE TEAM STATS: FG 14-32; 3PT 2-11; FT 2-5; AST 7; RBS 12; TO 16; STL 8; BLK 1; FLS 14.

ELYRIA CHRISTIAN EAGLE INDIVIDUAL STAT LEADERS:

Scoring (32): Josef Hobson – 8; Zach Stucky – 6; Kaden Aroum – 4; Bret Anderson – 4; Dominick Lundberg – 4; Keyan Wiggers – 4; Ben Unruh – 2.   

3-Pointers Made (2): Hobson – 2. 

Assists (7): Stucky – 5; Hobson, Anderson – 1.    

Rebounds (12): Anderson – 3; Hobson, Stucky, Wiggers, Unruh – 2; Josh Allen – 1.    

Steals (8): Stucky – 3; Aroum -2; Hobson, Anderson, Unruh – 1.    

Blocked Shots (1): Wiggers – 1.    

LITTLE RIVER REDSKIN TEAM STATS: FG 21-38; 3PT 5-12; FT 5-9; AST 10; RBS 23; TO 10; STL 9; BLK 1; FLS 9.

LITTLE RIVER REDSKIN INDIVIDUAL STAT LEADERS:

Scoring (52): Jayden Garrison – 18; Trey Rolfs – 10; Braxton Lafferty – 10; Graham Stephens – 7; Rylan Konen – 7.

3-Pointers Made (5): Garrison – 3; Rolfs, Stephens – 1.

Assists (10): Garrison – 4; Stephens – 3; Rolfs – 2; Lafferty – 1.

Rebounds (23): Rolfs – 7; Garrison, Lafferty, Stephens – 4; Konen – 3; Allen Burrola – 1.

Steals (9): Rolfs – 4; Garrison – 2; Lafferty, Stephens, Dalton Mantz – 1.

Blocked Shots (1): Lafferty – 1.

{Elyria Christian Eagle and Little River Redskin Postings are SPONSORED by CrossDove Creations}

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