The Horizon boys basketball team went into Sherman last Friday night riding a four game winning streak and were 4-1 in league play.
However, the boys were unable to keep their winning streak going against an undefeated Sherman team that sits atop of the 1A-6 Big Sky League standings.
Horizon fell to Sherman by a final score of 73-51.
The boys had kept this game close in the first half. In the first quarter, they were down 17-13, but would outscore Sherman 19-15 in the second to tie the game at 32 heading into halftime.
The Hawks second quarter play took away some of that early momentum Sherman had built with their 17-13 lead.
A 0-0 ball game at the start of the second half was a picture perfect situation for the boys to be in on the road against the league’s number one team.
However, the Hawks would struggle on both ends of the floor in the third quarter and were outscored 23-4.
Troubles to score outside of their top three scorers and inability to guard Sherman’s Jacob Justesen, who had 29 points against the Hawks, was Horizon’s downfall in the third quarter. Also, the Hawks had 18 turnovers in this game compared to Sherman’s five.
Sherman would outscore the Hawks 41-19 in the second half to come away with the 73-51 victory, dropping Horizon to 4-2 league play.
Junior guard Bailey Holste led the Hawks in scoring with 16 points on five of eight shooting from the field.
Behind Holste was junior forward Derek Johnston, who had 15 points and two assists.
With 13 points on the night, on four of seven shooting, was freshman guard Caleb Lingel.
Other than these three, no other Horizon player was in double-digits and only one other player scored — Kyle Brown, who had five points.
After a breakdown on the road versus Sherman, the boys were able to pull it together the following night versus Condon/Wheeler at home, despite a rough start.
In the first quarter, the Hawks were not performing well, and it led to Head Coach Darrin Lingel calling back-to-back timeouts at three minutes and 1:45 in the first quarter, as he was clearly frustrated with how his team was playing on the defensive end of the floor.
The entire first quarter, Condon/Wheeler was having their way in the paint, nearly getting a wide-open look at the basket whenever they had wanted to, and that led to them jumping out to an early 17-12 advantage heading into the second quarter.
In the second quarter, the Hawks put up more of a fight, but it still seemed Condon/Wheeler could get into the paint area at will and they went into halftime up 32-26.
With the Hawks’ third quarter struggles the night before, the boys were clearly focused on not having a repeat of what happen versus Sherman.
The boys came out playing on both ends of the floor and ended the third quarter with a 45-43 lead after outscoring Condon/Wheeler 19-11.
However, there was still a quarter left of play and the boys couldn’t afford to drop this game at home if they wanted to keep close with Sherman in the league standings.
In the fourth, the Hawks outscored Sherman 19-15 and came out with the 64-58 win to move to 5-1 in league play.
Johnston seemed to not appreciate the 29 points put up by Sherman’s Justesen the night before, as he followed up that performance with a 29-point performance of his own versus Condon/Wheeler.
Lingel continued his consistency as the second-leading scorer on this team as he had 16 points and six assists.
And the last double-digit scorer for the Hawks against Condon/Wheeler was Holste,who had 10 points and six assists.
Upcoming games:
The boys travel to Dufur on Friday, Jan. 26 before they’re back at home versus Arlington on Saturday, Jan. 27. Tip-off versus Arlington is at 5:30 p.m.
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