Metro Sports Report

Marion drops Wamac battle to Raiders

In a battle for Wamac conference supremacy Friday night at Marion, the host Indians were doomed by a dreadful second quarter and were downed by the Raiders of Williamsburg, 53-37.

With five veteran senior starters (four of them tall and all fast), Williamsburg simply outplayed the scrappy but less experienced West Division challengers.

The Indians (7-3) did hold their own for awhile, displaying a feisty defense that kept them within a basket at 11-9 after the first quarter. But then their shooting turned as icy as the outdoor air.

No. 9 Eagles surge past Marshalltown

The Kirkwood men's basketball team went from awful to awesome during the course of a single game Wednesday night.

The result was a satisfying 74-64 victory for the ninth-ranked Eagles over Marshalltown at Johnson Hall.

Kirkwood (12-3) shot 28.6 percent from the field and scored only 22 points in the first half, but the Eagles sizzled in the second half with 62.5 percent marksmanship and 52 points.

"We played kind of tentative and scared in the first half," said Jordan Ashton, who led Kirkwood with 21 points. "We weren't attacking them, they were attacking us more. And the second half we definitely took it to them."

Marshalltown (16-4) led 44-33 early in the second half when the Eagles caught fire for a 15-3 spurt, turning their 11-point deficit into a 48-47 advantage. Ashton nailed two 3-pointers and scored eight straight points during the surge to help get his team untracked.

Ashton shot 5-for-7 from the field in the second half, including a 3-for-4 showing from 3-point range after struggling to find openings in the first 20 minutes.

Ollinger mostly sits as Lions top Cougars

Kennedy Coach Tony Vis had a bad feeling before tipoff at Linn-Mar Tuesday night, but he thought it would pass.

“We knew they were an outside-oriented team and like to shoot from out there,” Vis said of the Class 5A eighth-ranked Lions. “They were hot in the warmups and, obviously, it carried right on over into the game.”

Indeed, Linn-Mar canned seven of nine 3-point attempts in the first half alone (and 11 overall for a new school record) while running out to a 33-14 lead.

The Cougars (7-3) tried mightily to catch up but still came up short, 62-49.

Amanda Ollinger made a quiet debut for Linn-Mar, playing briefly in the third quarter and finishing with one steal. She transferred to Linn-Mar from Jefferson during the holiday break.

Even without Ollinger's help, the Lions were too much for the Cougars.

“I thought from a certain point in the second quarter on, we played pretty well,” said Vis. “The start was the key with that 19-point hole. It seemed like we were going to be stuck on five points all night.”

Klostermann, Brandt boost Lions by Cougars

When you prepare for a basketball game against the Linn-Mar Lions, the first thing you do is figure out a way to slow down Jordan Bohannon and Nic Uhlir.

Beau Klostermann and Jordan Brandt barely get a mention in the scouting report, but they played a big role for the Lions off the bench Tuesday night.

Klostermann scored a career-high 17 points and Brandt added 10 as the 10th-ranked Lions topped the ninth-ranked Kennedy Cougars, 74-61, in a Mississippi Valley Conference game at Kennedy.