BOYS BASKETBALL: Falcons cruise past Waterford

Falcons’ Jaeden Zackery dribbles past Waterford’s William Ketterhagen in pursuit of a basket during Friday’s Southern Lakes Conference contest (Photo courtesy of Nancy Switalla)

By Jason Arndt
Editor

Westosha Central High School junior Adam Simmons believes his squad is peaking at the right time.

The Falcons, winners of their last four games entering Friday’s Southern Lakes Conference contest with visiting Waterford, certainly showed they were at their peak.

Using its full offensive arsenal, Westosha Central jumped to a 34-24 edge entering halftime, courtesy of a 17-0 first half run.

From there, the Falcons went from cruise control to stepping on the accelerator in the second half, where they outscored the Wolverines 40-19 to come away with a 74-43 victory.

With the win, the Falcons (17-3, 11-2) stayed within one game of conference leader Union Grove, which hosts Westosha Central on Thursday.

Simmons, who scored eight of his 13 points in the first half, said the Falcons’ fifth straight win comes at a critical point of the season.

“We are just peaking and coming together,” said Simmons.

The squad came together quickly in the first half, where they held a 7-6 lead before senior Joey Gilliland sparked a 17-0 run, which Simmons capped off with a basket to extend the Falcons edge to 24-6 with 7 minutes, 15 seconds left in the opening frame.

“We just got out on transition and they weren’t getting back very quickly, so we beat them down on the floor,” said Simmons, who knocked in six of the Falcons’ 17 points in scoring run.

The Falcons transition game, meanwhile, was engineered by junior Jaeden Zackery.

Zackery, who accounted for 13 points to tie Simmons as the contest’s leader, forced seven of the Falcons 11 total steals.

With his seven steals, Zackery either took the basketball to the rim, or dished it off teammates. He finished with eight assists.

“We feed off of each other,” said Zackery. “That is what is best about our game, we are just fast.”

Along with Zackery and Simmons, the Falcons received 10 points from both Gilliland and senior Nic Frederick, who scored the game’s first points.

“We are well-balanced on offense, on any given night, any one of our guys can step up and have a good night,” said Falcons coach James Hyllberg.

Westosha Central, which had its largest opening half lead at 27-12, eventually saw the edge diminish to 30-24 towards the end of the first frame.

“I thought we missed some easy baskets in the first half,” said Hyllberg.

Meanwhile, for Waterford (7-13, 3-10), the Wolverines received a team-leading 11 points from Matt Borchardt, who drilled three first half 3-pointers.

Of Borchardt’s three perimeter shots, two came at the start of the contest, which kept the Wolverines within one point of the lead at 7-6.

“(Borchardt) kept them in the game in the first half, just starting shooting 3’s, that was the only thing that got us,” Simmons said. “We just had to pay more attention to him in the second half.”

In the second half, the Falcons held Borchardt to two points, and secured the victory after producing runs of 8-0, 10-0 and 8-0.

Next up: Broncos
With two games left, including the season finale at conference leader Union Grove, Hyllberg knows his team needs to stay at its peak.

Union Grove, which lost the six meetings to the Falcons entering the season, defeated them 60-51 on Jan. 19.

“We finish up against Union Grove on Thursday,” said Hyllberg. “We want to be playing our best ball and limit turnovers.”


Posted

in

,

by

Tags: