Marshalltown boys basketball didn’t have the rhythm to beat Southeast Polk on Monday night.
Foul trouble and missed offensive looks sapped the Bobcats’ momentum in a 56-48 loss to Southeast Polk in the Roundhouse at Marshalltown High School.
The Rams used several scoring spurts to eventually break free of the Bobcats. A 10-0 run at the end of the second quarter rallied SEP to a 26-23 halftime lead and a 7-0 run in the fourth quarter pushed their lead to 53-40, and MHS wasn’t within seven points the rest of the way.
Kyle Smith led the Bobcats with 18 points and Drake Gersema and LaMar Johnson added 14 and nine points, respectively.
Gersema collected his third foul with two minutes left in the first half.
“How we had to play that game with foul trouble, I just don’t know if we could get in the rhythm to where we could get consecutive stops,” MHS head coach Michael Appel said. “And a lot of it comes down to those hustle plays, a 50/50 ball where it’s on the ground and they come up with it and then score, or kick it out for a three. We needed to come up with a lot more of those hustle plays.”
Twice in the first half, Marshalltown had seven-point leads on the strength of some scoring runs in the first and second quarter.
The Bobcats couldn’t string two scores together in the third quarter, outscored 15-8 by the Rams, and while MHS fought to keep pressure on Southeast Polk, they couldn’t get to that one-possession game to make the visitors sweat.
“I thought we had some nice looks at the rim and just missed some layups, missed some bunnies,” Appel said. “We were patient at times with our offense and got some good looks, and we’re just figuring that out and are gonna continue to improve. … We didn’t handle their pressure well at times and we just need to figure out ways to get open when they’re doing that so that we’re not fighting it so hard.”
A Smith 3-pointer with 2:38 left in the game made it 53-46 in favor of Southeast Polk and the Bobcats got the ball back after a turnover but a Jamison Niehouse 3 from the left wing didn’t go, one of three consecutive possessions where the Bobcats came up empty as the Rams inched away at the free-throw line.
“It would’ve been nice to get to our pressure a little bit sooner, but with the amount our guys played tonight, we were pretty gassed at the end of it,” Appel said. “Maybe that’s something we can look at, rotating guys a bit sooner to get them some breaks and maybe give us some legs at the end of the game.”
Gersema scored eight of his 14 points in the second half; the sophomore is gradually establishing himself as one of the secondary options to Smith, who came into the game with a team-leading 19.8 points per game.
“Drake made some really good drives tonight, made some really good pull-up shots and understood where he had a driving lane there,” Appel said. “As the game went on, you could tell he was getting a little bit more tired, maybe some of his decisions weren’t as good, but he’ll learn and grow from that, watch some film and understand.”
The Bobcats fell to 2-3 overall and, pending a possible Thursday reschedule of last Friday’s postponed game at Mason City, has one game left on the 2024 schedule back in the Roundhouse on Friday against Fort Dodge.
“We’ve got to use these next two days to continue to get better,” Appel said. “We challenge them to improve every day, and the guys are really becoming students of the game and understanding how to learn and improve. If we continue to do that, I like our chances. Whatever the results may be, I know these guys want to do it, and they’re going to give the best effort.”
Southeast Polk 56, Marshalltown 48
SE POLK (2-3) — Emmanuel Tete 4 5-8 13, Grady Braunshweigh-Norris 2 1-4 5, Henry Gaffney 2 0-0 4, Rex Smith 7 0-0 15, Luke Bartlett 5 2-2 16, Josh Barjolo 0 3-4 3, Tyler Hegg 0 0-0 0. TOTALS 20 11-18 56.
MARSHALLTOWN (2-3) — Jamison Niehouse 2 0-0 4, Drake Gersema 7 0-0 14, Kyle Smith 5 5-5 18, LaMar Johnson 4 1-1 9, Jacob Hayes 1 0-0 3, Adam Boone 0 0-0 0, Zane Moore 0 0-0 0, Will Swartz 0 0-0 0. TOTALS 19 6-6 48.
SE POLK 10 16 15 15 — 56
MHS 15 8 8 17 — 48
3-Point Goals–SEP 5 (Bartlett 4, Smith), MHS 4 (Smith 3, Hayes). Team Fouls–SEP 13, MHS 17. Fouled Out–Gersema. Technical Foul–Tete.