The highs and the lows

he Hartley-Melvin-Sanborn basketball teams experienced highs and lows during non-conference games with Graettinger-Terril/Ruthven-Ayrshire, on Dec. 11 at Graettinger.

Experiencing the highs were the Hawk girls, who took control of their game in the second half to earn a 64-52 win.

H-M-S led much of opening half, holding a 15-14 advantage after one quarter and extending it to 26-20. The Titans then responded with a 7-0 run to close out the half, giving them a 27-26 lead.

The Hawks regained the lead early in third quarter and maintained it with the exception of a 38-38 tie. Moriah Otto scored five points in the final 90 seconds and Abby Douma added a basket to push the lead to 45-40.

Kylee Schiphoff scored four points early in the final quarter to make it a nine-point game. GT/RA cut the margin to six, but the Hawks were able to pull away for the win.

"[The] game with GTRA was a great confidence booster going into a week with three away games, two of which being conference games," said Hawk coach Ashley Tessum. "Our teamwork on the floor was phenomenal. The girls did a great job of looking up the floor, finding our post players and limiting turnovers. It was a fun game watching how well they worked together."

Scoring leaders were Otto with 21 points, Schiphoff with 11 and Frankie Mohni and Douma with 10 each. Gracie Knobloch and Lindsey Van Es added four points. The Hawks made 25-of-49 shots from the floor and 11-of-16 at the free throw line.

H-M-S also had balanced performances on the glass. Eliza Tewes and Schiphoff finished with six rebounds while Douma, Knobloch and Mohni had five. Knobloch added three assists and two steals, Mohni had three assists, Douma recorded three blocks and Schiphoff had two steals.

Addison Hansen led the Titans with 13 points.

• Turnovers, defense are issues for boys

In the boys' game, GTRA ran out to a 20-point lead and cruised to a 70-24 win.

The Titans built a 28-8 lead by the end of the first half and extended it to 44-13 at the intermission.

"I thought the two most concerning aspects were our turnovers and our struggles defensively. We had too many live ball turnovers leading to scores for GTRA," Hawk coach Naet Hoaglund observed. "We let GTRA get into a rhythm offensively early in the game where they were able to hit four or five threes and the onslaught was on."

The Hawks trailed 60-19 at the end of the third quarter and continued to fall behind the rest of the game.

"Our guys are playing hard and working hard. We just haven't been able to compete the way we need to," Hoaglund added.

Bradley Van Beek scored eight points, Jayden Leth scored six, Lawton Schiphoff scored five, Alex Billings and George Vargas scored two points each, and Zac Pearson added a free throw. H-M-S made 9-of-35 shots from the field and committed 22 turnovers.

Rebounding leaders were Billings with five, and Josh Cruz, Van Beek and Vargas with four. Cruz also had three assists.

Leading scorer for GTRA was Kasey Hough with 25 points.