Prairie High School - Cedar Rapids, Iowa

Prairie girls bounce J-Hawks

In his second season with the vastly improved Prairie girls basketball team, Josh Bentley may have found the secret of coaching.

“When the shots are falling, it makes the coach look good,” he said Tuesday night after his near-flawless crew surprisingly throttled Jefferson, 57-31, at Prairie.

And it was no fluke that Prairie had a hot shooting night by hitting 22 of 50 (44 percent), according to star senior guard Olivia Usher.

"Defensively, we really came out ready to play,” she said. “When we’re playing good defense, it makes our offense work a lot better.”

In an almost perfect performance, Usher led the Hawks with 19 points, with eight of them coming in a 20-2 Prairie run after the score was tied 9-9.

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Rinderknecht leaving Prairie for college soccer

Seth Rinderknecht fell in love with soccer a long time ago and has dreamed about playing at the Division I level in college.

Now he's going to get an early start.

Rinderknecht plans to graduate from Cedar Rapids Prairie this month and enroll at Nebraska-Omaha in January to begin his freshman year in college and join their soccer program.

Rinderknecht made the decision to leave early during the summer and arranged his classes to fulfill all his academic requirements for graduation. In addition to his classes at Prairie, he's taking three college-level courses at Kirkwood to help meet Nebraska-Omaha's requirements as well.

Nebraska-Omaha offered Rinderknecht a scholarship last spring and suggested he think about enrolling early. Soccer is played during the fall in college, so this way he'll be further along than other new players.

"They said it's a really good way to adapt to the new style of college soccer," he explained. "You're going to adapt to school and meet new friends, you're going to get training in and everything during the spring.

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Prairie grapplers win Independence title

INDEPENDENCE - Cedar Rapids Prairie crowned three champions and captured top honors at the Independence wrestling tournament Saturday.

Marcus England, Sam Uthoff and Taylor Mehmen came home with titles for the Hawks.

England pinned Kyle Prewitt of Christian Brothers College in 1:46 for the crown at 113 pounds. Uthoff pinned Chase Lienhard of Crestwood in 3:20 for the championship at 132 pounds. Mehmen trimmed Matt McMillan of Independence, 9-7, in overtime for the title at 195.

Clint Lembeck of Xavier won the 138-pound title with a 10-4 victory over Drew Davis of Independence in the finals.

Johnny Clymer of Linn-Mar won the 145-pound crown with a 4-3 victory over Josh Gerke of Xavier.

Prairie claimed the team championship with 223.5 points. Crestwood finished second with 159 points. Linn-Mar placed sixth and Xavier finished seventh out of 12 squads.

TEAM STANDINGS

1. Prairie 223.5, 2. Crestwood 159, 3. Independence 145.5, 4. Alburnett 139.5, 5. Christian Brothers College 130, 6. Linn-Mar 128, 7. Xavier 122.5, 8. Hampton-Dumont 119, 9. Osage 113, 10. North Fayette 104, 11. Algona 68, 12. Chariton 28.5.

Prairie girls hold off Marion

Tight defense and excellent free-throw shooting can win a lot of basketball games at any level of the sport

The Cedar Rapids Prairie girls proved it Saturday afternoon.

The Hawks put the clamps on Marion star Chloe Rice and sank 23 of 25 free throws for a 56-49 victory over the Indians at the Prairie gym.

Rice, a 5-foot-10 sophomore who is being recruited by Division I schools, struggled the entire game and did not make a field goal until she banked in a long 3-pointer at the buzzer to finish with five points.

Meanwhile, Prairie marched to the foul line and hit an incredible 92 percent of its free throws to help stave off a furious rally by Marion in the fourth quarter.

Caitlyn Smith of Marion drained four 3-pointers during an incredible two-minute stretch in the fourth quarter as the Indians chopped a 15-point deficit to just three points at 45-42, but the Hawks regrouped and pulled away again.

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