Hillsboro, Halstead swap lopsided wins

The Hillsboro basketball teams encountered a reversal of fortune in their games against Halstead Tuesday in Halstead.

The Hillsboro girls were on the happy side of a 61-27 blowout, but the Hillsboro boys endured the frustrating end of a 50-18 defeat. Both games ended with a running clock after the leads grew to 30 points in the fourth quarter.

Another oddity, the losing team in each contest struck first blood. Halstead?s Alyssa Talbott drained a three-pointer 28 seconds into the contest to give Halstead a 3-0 start. But the Trojans slowly picked up steam offensively, scoring the next seven points on the way to a 16-6 lead after the first quarter. Tena Loewen lit the Trojans? fire with seven points coming off the bench.

Using its full-court pressure to prime the pump, Hillsboro began the second quarter with a 10-0 run and never slowed down on the way to a 32-13 halftime bulge. Loewen had 12 points by intermission and Allie Faul 8.

Faul tossed in seven points in the third quarter as the Trojans pushed their lead to 52-25 at the final break. When Faul hit a three-pointer to start the final quarter, Hillsboro led by 30 and the running clock kicked in.

Faul led all scorers with 20 points, her most productive game of the season. Loewen finished with 14 as the Trojans improved to 7-0 for the season after this non-league encounter.

Hillsboro shot 50 percent from the floor (23-46) for the game, while limiting the Dragons to 34 percent shooting (10-29) and a night of 26 turnovers.

In the boys? game, the Trojans struck first blood when Ben Bebermeyer scored on a fast-break layup 35 seconds after tip-off. But the production fell flat as 3-for-9 shooting put the Trojans on the short side of a 14-6 score by the end of the first quarter.

It got worse as Hillsboro missed all eight of its shots from the floor in the second quarter. Only a decent defensive effort kept the Trojans as close as 19-8 at intermission.

But in the third quarter, the defense went flat, too, as Halstead went on an 8-0 burst through the first 2:40. By the end of the quarter the home team had expanded the lead to 33-13. The running clock kicked in with 2:12 to play when MeKial Bliss cashed in four consecutive free throws after personal and technical fouls were called against a frustrated Brett Weinbrenner. The charities made the score 50-18.

The Trojans finished a disappointing evening with 20 percent shooting from the floor (7-35) as they dropped to 3-4 for the year. Meanwhile, Halstead (5-2) warmed up from an 8-for-27 first half of shooting with 12-for-16 accuracy in the second half.

More from Hillsboro Free Press
Weddings (Jan. 29, 2009)
Audrey Davies and David Priel, both of Alexandria, Va., were married Aug....
Read More