Springville Orioles fly past Highland

IOWA CITY - Highland hit two buzzer-beating shots Thursday in a Class 1A District 7 high school boys basketball game against Springville. One was at the end of the first quarter by Bill Laughlin from right at half court. The other was at the end of the game by Matt Butler.

The Huskies did not make many shots in between those two and lost to Springville, 59-35.

Springville never trailed in the game and if it wasn't for Mason McFarland's three 3-pointers in the first quarter, Highland would have been behind by more than the 20-14 deficit it faced.

McFarland finished with 12 as the only Husky to finish in double figures. There were four Orioles in double figures.

'Those three guards shoot over 40 percent from three for them,” Highland coach Bill Zywiec said. 'They shot extremely well. They moved the ball well. They were the better team tonight. They shot us out of our zone. We were afraid that would happen. We did not ever recover from it.”

Zywiec called time with 3 minutes, 34 seconds left in the second quarter and the score 31-18 to switch to a man defense.

The Orioles' press made a difference in the second quarter as they held a 36-18 lead at intermission.

'We did not get as much out of our press as we typically do,” Springville coach Nick Merrit said. 'We do have a lot of guys that can shoot the ball. We caught fire early and that really helped us out.”

The quick start was crucial for the Orioles.

'This is the first time our guys of been to this level of the tournament so I was worried about nerves, but we got those out of the way,” Merritt said. 'I could tell at halftime that we were on top of things.”

Having twice the amount of points the other team has would be comforting to most teams.

Zywiec changed some things in the locker room.

'At halftime, we decided to try to spread their defense out a little bit more and slide (Zack Lasek) from the high post to the low corner, but we had to get some more shots to loosen them up,” he said. 'We hit some early, but our shots were not falling.”

Lasek made two baskets in the second quarter and one in the third.

'They were able to set the pack it in on our big man,” Zywiec said. 'We needed more shots go down like we did against North Cedar and that would've helped.”

The Orioles had a 19-2 that spanned the second and third quarters and led 50-29 at the end of the third.

'We were very concerned about him,” Merritt said. 'He is a great player. We spent a lot of time prepping for him. We just played with confidence.”

With the 21-point lead, the Orioles were able to milk the clock in the fourth quarter.

It was Zywiec's first season coaching the Huskies.

'I told the kids I appreciate everything they did. There was not one complaint from one of those kids all season. No one showed up late for anything we did. That is a good building block for us. This is going to sting for a little bit. I told the kids not to dwell on this one game. We had a 20-5 season and they should appreciate how much fun we had. I know they learned some life lessons over the course of the season and they are all going to go on and do great things in their life.”

Springville (19-5) plays Pekin, a 59-49 winner over New London winner, Saturday at 7 p.m. at Iowa City West.