Metro Sports Report

Gerke gets 100th pin, heads to state

Xavier senior Josh Gerke collected three pins at the Class 3A district  wrestling tournament Saturday and is headed to the state tournament  with 101 pins in his career.

Gerke, Patrick Chambers and Alex Francois all finished second in their  weight classes for the Saints and qualified for state as district  runners-up.

Gerke lost to Caleb Conway of Marion, 4-2 in overtime, in the  championship at 145 pounds. Gerke (38-3) has lost only three times all  season, and all three setbacks have been to Conway.

Gerke began the tournament with pins in 2:18 and 2:42 before being  nipped by Conway. Gerke got his third pin in the wrestle-back for  second place to make the state meet for the second straight year.

Gerke is only the third wrestler in Metro history to reach 100 pins.  Matt Wycoff recorded 124 pins for Marion from 1997-2000 and is the  all-time Metro leader. Alijah Jeffery had 105 pins for Linn-Mar from  2011-14.

Saints tame Lions for 8th straight

The Xavier girls basketball team has not lost a game in four weeks and  is riding an eight-game winning streak heading into the postseason,  matching their longest victory streak in six years.

If the Saints can win two more games in a row, they'll finish the  season at the Class 4A state tournament in Des Moines.

The sixth-ranked Saints held Linn-Mar to 16 points in the first three  quarters Friday night and hung on for a 40-35 victory in the final  game of the regular season at Ron Thillen Gymnasium.

Xavier will take a 15-6 record into the regional semifinals next  Saturday night at home and would host the regional finals on Tuesday,  Feb. 21 if they are still alive.

"I like where we're at, except maybe free throws," said Xavier Coach  Tom Lilly after the Saints swept the season series from Linn-Mar for  the first time in five years.

The Saints finished only 11 for 21 at the free throw line, helping the  Lions chop a 14-point deficit to only four points in the final stages  before time ran out on the visitors.

Linn-Mar got back into the game with a trapping zone defense that  forced turnovers and left the Saints standing around too much, waiting  for something good to happen instead of being aggressive.

"We were holding on for dear life," said Lilly.

Saints notch biggest win over L-M

A few dozen Xavier High School students spilled onto the court and celebrated a 64-48 victory over the Linn-Mar Lions Friday night, but those happy students did not know the entire story.

As it turns out, the 16-point victory over Linn-Mar is the biggest for  the Xavier boys basketball program in the 36-game history between the  two Metro schools.

The Saints topped the Lions by 10 points two years ago, but otherwise  Linn-Mar has dominated the series since they began playing in the  1998-99 campaign when Xavier High School opened for business.

Linn-Mar won the first 29 meetings, many of them by lopsided margins,  but the Saints have a 4-4 record against the Lions in the past four  seasons and are fighting back.

All told, Linn-Mar leads the series 32-4.

Linn-Mar is experiencing a rare "down" year for boys basketball with a  7-11 overall record, but they still have talented players and have  posted some good victories this season.

Xavier Coach Ryan Luehrsmann was happy with his club's performance on  Hall of Fame Night at Ron Thillen Gymnasium.

"I thought we were very good in stretches," he said. "We shared the  ball very well on the offensive end and for the most part were decent  on defense.

Wrong call helps Saints top Cougars

Kennedy Coach Tony Vis and Hailey Dolphin studied the replay of her  final shot against Xavier Tuesday night and came to the same forlorn conclusion.

Dolphin's 3-pointer in the final second of the game should have counted and forced overtime against the Saints, but there was absolutely nothing they could do about it.

Xavier trimmed the young Cougars, 58-55, in their Mississippi Valley Conference game at Ron Thillen Gymnasium and that's the way it will go into the record books.

Dolphin's 3-pointer hit the rim, bounced high over the basket and came down through the net, but the officials ruled the ball hit the strap that's used to hoist the backboard to the ceiling when the gym is used  for other events.

(CLICK HERE TO SEE VIDEO OF SHOT)

Once the ball hits the strap it's a dead ball and the shot does not count, but the replay on Kennedy's iPad clearly showed that the ball  missed the strap by a few inches.

"I just wish they would have let the kids decide it," Vis said calmly.  "I don't think the officials, on purpose, hosed anybody.

"I think they thought they saw what they saw, but obviously they didn't. They don't have the opportunity to look at it on video like we  do.