Keota brave in loss to Montezuma

WILLIAMSBURG - The closest Union area postseason game Tuesday was a 53-51 Class 1A substate semifinal boys basketball battle between South Iowa Cedar League foes Montezuma and Keota, won by the Braves once again.

Montezuma was been a nemesis for the Eagles with last year's 66-48 win in a substate semifinal. Montezuma went on to finish third at state. The 2018 postseason was ended by the Braves as well as regular season losses. The closest was a 76-68 loss in Keota Jan. 21 2020. The last game Keota won against Montezuma was in 2017 and the score was just as close as Tuesday, in fact the same close score as Tuesday. It was 53-51.

How close was it? Keota was 20-of-44 (5-of-16 on threes) from the field, Montezuma 21-of-46 (4-of-19 3-pointers). Free throws were 6-for-9 and 7-for-9 (Montezuma). Keota had 15 turnovers, 17 for Montezuma. Keota had seven steals, the Braves eight. Montezuma had 29 rebounds to 21 for Keota.

Keota (20-3) ends the year. Montezuma (21-2) plays Saturday at Knoxville for the Substate 6 championship and a berth in the state tournament against Mount Ayr (19-4), a 62-51 winner over Moravia (19-4).

'There was never bigger than a six-point lead,” Keota head coach Dan Stout said. 'They were up that much early. We did get a five-point lead at one point.”

This year's regular season meeting was Jan. 15. Keota was ranked No. 7 and lost at Montezuma 80-46, trailed 20-7 and 44-13 after the first two quarters. Tuesday Keota trailed 15-13 but tied it at halftime 26-26. A 37-35 Braves lead started the fourth quarter.

Tuesday's game saw Luke Hammen score 22 points, Carson Sprouse 15 and both shot over 50 percent. Brady Duwa had eight rebounds and Bryce Greiner five. Greiner had 16 points for Keota in the January game, Hammen 11. Montezuma's Trey Shearer scored 21, Eddie Burgess 16 and Cole Watts 15. Burgess had 15 rebounds.

Burgess improved on that total Tuesday with 17 rebounds and scored 14 points. Watts had 20 but Shearer had nine on 3-of-9 shooting.

'We played really well on Trey,” Stout said. 'We played a solid 2-3 zone defense.”

Stout had previously joked that the Eagles could get the opening tip and stall to win 2-0. Montezuma averages 74 points a game, Keota 62.

'We never stalled,” Stout said. 'We were down four with about three minutes to play. We were able to fight back and got it tied.”

With under a minute to play Montezuma worked it and converted with 30 seconds.

'We came down and Sprouse got a lay up to tie it with 20 seconds to play,” Stout said. 'Trey got in the lane and banked in 5-foot shot with 6 seconds to play.”

Shearer has scored over 2,000 points in his career as a Brave and Watts has over 1,000.

'We came down the floor for the last shot, but we got it off just after the horn went off and it rimmed out,” Stout said. 'The refs were waving it off so it would not have counted.”