Ranked Montezuma teams sweep Keota

KEOTA - Montezuma had more cheerleaders than Keota High School had players on the girls basketball team.

Montezuma had as many coaches as the Keota girls team.

In the most important counting of Tuesday evening's South Iowa Cedar League play, the No. 4 (Class 1A) Montezuma boys team ended up with more points than Keota, 76-68.

The No. 1 Montezuma girls team raced out to a 24-2 lead in the first quarter over an Eagle team with just five players and didn't play their starters after halftime in winning 58-16.

The Keota boys got a slow start, trailing 24-11 after the first quarter, but a 10-0 run in the middle of the second quarter was highlighted by a 4-point play by JD Stout, who finished with 28 points. Keota got within 28-27 with the run and a Bryce Greiner rebound and put-back at the halftime buzzer sent the teams to the locker room with the Braves ahead 31-29.

'We had the momentum going into halftime so maybe if there wasn't halftime, we could've won,” Stout said. 'It was fun to play in but a lot more fun if we would've scored more points than them.”

The third quarter was a back-and-forth battle and the Eagles took their first lead at 51-50 with eight seconds left in the frame, but two free throws by Trey Shearer gave the Braves the lead at 52-51 starting the fourth quarter.

'We like to make it interesting,” Montezuma head coach Derrick Dengler said. 'We know there's a big crowd here, so we wanted to keep them entertained.”

Stout made 1-of-2 foul shots to start the fourth quarter, but Monte went on an 8-0 run that stretched to 12-3 before Stout's 3-point play. Monte then scored the next eight points to complete a 20-6 run that decided the game.

'We did a heckuva job fighting back into it after that poor first quarter,” Keota head coach Dan Stout said. 'That hurt not to have Duwa out there, especially defensively.”

Duwa picked up his fourth foul with 1 minute, 33 seconds remaining in the third quarter. He never fouled out.

'You play different with four fouls or you don't play at all because you are sitting next to me,” Coach Stout said.

Shearer had 12 of those 20 points in the run and finished with 38.

'Right now, we don't have an answer for him,” Coach Stout said. 'He's had three games against us with a total of 120 points in those games.”

Luke Hammen had 13 points and Keota teammate Carson Sprouse added 12 and Duwa eight.

'Keota is a good team, tremendous offensive players,” Dengler said. 'We didn't change anything to start the fourth quarter. I think our guys just settled down and executed our game plan and got shots at the rim instead of settling. Defensively, we just started locking up a little bit better.”

Stout made six 2-pointers, two treys and was 10-of-11 at the foul line while Shearer made 10 twos, three triples and was 9-of-12 on free throws.

'It was definitely the most fun game of the year that we have had,” JD Stout said. 'These are the games we live for and the moments we want to be in. Trey is a ballplayer, but we gave them too many looks and we paid for it. I don't want to say this was for the conference but that was for the lead in the conference and our goal this year was to win it.”

Keota is now 9-2, 7-1 while Montezuma is 10-1, 8-0.

'We took a couple bad shots and had some turnovers that helped them (go on the 20-6 run),” Coach Stout said. 'They held their composure more than we did down the stretch and that's unfortunate because I thought we were the more experienced team.”

Macie McDonald had six points for the Keota girls while Sky Weber notched four points as did Jordan Hammen. Bailey Sieren scored two.

'It is a challenge for us to only have five players but it's what we got, you can't walk away from it, so we compete,” Keota girls coach Jeff Sprouse said. 'Regardless of score and time, there are certain things that we are capable of regardless if the other team is better than us which Montezuma obviously is. We still have to go out and execute and do the best that we possibly can and I think we did that.”

Taylor Kindred's injury last week left the Eagles with just five players.

'Not having Taylor in there hurts,” Sprouse said. 'I think we're doing a good job adjusting. The thing is, the kids are all capable and they're not afraid. Jordan shot the ball well. Macie did a good job handling the ball and getting things set up. Bailey had a tough night shooting, but she took good shots. I was pleased with our night. We got some good shots in the first quarter against the first team. I was proud of that.”