The IMS girls and boys basketball teams celebrated Senior night Friday at Hillcrest Union with a pair of conference wins over Wapello. The IMS girls raced out to a 15-4 lead and held on for a 44-41 win. IMS held a 13 point lead after the first quarter as Riley Schmeider and Olivia Yutzy combined for the first 12 points of the night. Yutzy put IMS up 30-21 going into the half on a jumper from the elbow at the buzzer. The shot gave Yutzy 1,000 career points, making her only the fourth IMS girls basketball player of all time to reach that mark. After the game Head Coach Aaron Gingerich talked about his teams first half effort to get out to a lead.
“Last time we played Wapello they bothered us with their triangle and two defense. I thought our girls did a good job just finding the gaps, and finding openings within the defense,” Gingerich said. “Riley is a good enough player that if you’re not guarding her she’ll take advantage of it and she keyed us early on. I thought Hannah had some nice looks, a couple of big threes to get us going, and then we got the ball to Olivia on the baseline. I was happy with our execution early on.”
In the second half Wapello began changing defenses from a trapping 1-3-1 zone to a trapping triangle and two. IMS had a hard time adjusting and posted just three field goals the entire second half. Wapello would get within 39-36 with 45 seconds to go and made the score 42-41 with just eight seconds remaining but IMS held on for the win with key free throws, going six of eight at the line in the final 45 seconds of the game. IMS was led by Yutzy’s 20 points, Kristin Davis added 11 including three, three point goals. With the win IMS is now 11-9 overall and will next be in action tonight when they host Danville in the Southeast Iowa Superconference Shoot Out.
It took IMS a while to get going in the boys game but when they did, they overwhelmed Wapello on the way to a 69-37 win. The Indians opened by scoring 10 of the games first 12 points, taking an early eight point lead. After trailing 15-5 late in the first quarter, IMS erupted. In the next 24 minutes IMS held Wapello to just five total field goals and outscored the Indians by a whopping 52-11 count, erasing the early deficit and building a lead large enough to enforce the continuous clock rule. Following the game Head Coach Dwight Gingerich talked about his teams run that led to the huge lead.
“I thought the guys really came together and were able to execute the things that we wanted to do, they played it hard, and paced it out to place that was better for us, we were able to run a little bit, and I thought that we were moving the ball a much better offensively tonight,” Gingerich said. “Eli Gingerich got us going with some perimeter shooting, and that kind of opened things up, and I thought that the ball movement there to get the ball to him as well as to our other shooters [was good] Dallas Nye nails one from outside, and then we were able to get the ball inside. Zach Hill did a nice job to getting himself inside and posting up strong.”
IMS was led by Eli Gingerich and his 16 points, including five, three point goals. Dallas Nye added a double double with 15 points and 10 rebounds. Reggie Hostetler had 13 for IMS. With the win Iowa Mennonite is now 15-4 overall. The IMS boys host Mediapolis on Tuesday.