Metro Sports Report

Paige enjoys life with the Tar Heels

He's gone snorkeling in Hawaii, played before immense crowds, started for one of the top basketball programs in the country as a freshman and gotten off to a good start in the classroom.

All things considered, Marcus Paige has made a smooth adjustment to college at the University of North Carolina.

"It's actually going pretty well. I'm enjoying it so far," he said Tuesday in a telephone interview. "I'm doing pretty well in school. That part has been fine. And the basketball has been great so far. I get along very well with the guys. It's been good."

Metro teams blanked in boys basketball poll

The good folks who vote in the Associated Press boys basketball poll don't think too highly of the Metro teams from Cedar Rapids and Linn-Mar.

At this point, it's hard to blame them.

The initial AP rankings were announced Monday and there are no Metro teams in the Top 10 of the Class 4A poll. The Linn-Mar Lions came close, but missed by a few votes.

Drew Wall fundraiser at hockey game Friday

A fundraiser for the Drew Wall LIVESTRONG Fund will be held at the Cedar Rapids Ice Arena Friday night during a high school hockey game.

The Cedar Rapids RoughRiders will face the Dubuque Devils at 6 p.m. This is an area high school game, not a USHL contest.

Free tickets for high school students may be obtained at the Kennedy High School activities office or by visiting www.kennedyactivities.com.

Prairie girls fall short of No. 2 City High

In a game of inches, the spunky Prairie Hawks played the Little Hawks of Iowa City High almost right down to the wire Tuesday night at home.

They lost at the end 50-42, but it was mostly because they didn’t have the size to keep the second-ranked team in the state from getting rebounds and buckets under the basket.

Prairie’s hard-nosed 5-foot-9 forward Courteney McCrary did her best to contain budding 6-foot-3 superstar Haley Lorenzen of City High. But she was forced to the bench in key stretches with foul trouble and eventually fouled out trying to keep the ball away from the towering Little Hawk post player.

“I thought Courteney played a great game defensively,” said Prairie Coach Steve Doser. “She put a lot of pressure on (Lorenzen) and played her smart. She made it tough for her to get points.”