WACO’s first loss comes from West Burlington

WEST BURLINGTON — The second game of the Southeast Iowa Super Conference Shootout between the No. 4 (Class 1A) WACO Warriors and the No. 6 (Class 2A) West Burlington Falcons was truly a clash of the titans.

As the No. 1 seeded teams in the SEISC North and South Division, the two earned the right to battle for conference supremacy.

Both squads entered the Saturday night matchup hosted by Southeastern Community College with unblemished records, WACO at 19-0 and West Burlington at 18-0.

In the end, it was the Falcons walking out of Loren Walker Arena with a 56-44 victory over the Warriors.

WACO got down early, but never wavered.

The Falcons scored the first 10 points of the contest with a layup, back-to-back threes and a pair of free throws.

Hunter Hughes got Warriors on the board from the stripe and Colton Leichty followed with a layup to cut the deficit to six, 10-4, but West Burlington struck again with the three ball.

After the Falcon’s Jace Figuereo converted an and-one to make it 13-4, guard Mason Watkins buried a three to make it 16-4.

WACO scored back-to-back twos to make it an eight point game, but once again the three ball stretched the Falcons lead to 19-8 at the end of the first.

West Burlington hit four from deep in the opening period.

The Warriors wasted no time responding in the second as they coupled defensive prowess while making a point to attack the rim.

Back-to-back shots from Simeon Reichenbach kicked off what would be a 15-1 quarter for WACO, giving them all the momentum heading into the half with a 23-20 lead.

“We had a nice second quarter there to get us the lead,” WACO head coach Paul Kissell said. “They came out early and hit those shots and seemed to get every loose ball and every rebound. Our kids battled back.”

The motivation carried over into the third for the Warriors as Reichenbach scored two and Leichty followed with back-to-back buckets to make it 29-20, the Warriors largest lead of the night.

West Burlington’s first bucket came at the 5:38 mark in the third and the Falcons began to rally.

From then on, the Falcons outscored the Warriors 16-5 to put themselves back on top 36-34 heading into the fourth. West Burlington hit back-to-back threes to end the third, the final coming from Brady Martin at the buzzer.

In the fourth, WACO took the lead from a Leichty three to start, 37-36, and tied it at 39-39, but the foul shots favored West Burlington in the end.

West Burlington hit one of its three fourth quarter threes to make it 42-39 and they would never trail again.

“You have to give credit to West Burlington,” Kissell said. “They hit shots, big shots. They played aggressive defense. Once their offense was clicking it pour over to the defensive end.”

WACO got it to two at 43-41, but the Falcons drilled a three with 1:46 to go and ended the game with 10 points from the foul line.

West Burlington took 16 foul shots in the final period.

“Those are the kinds of game you want to play every night,” Kissell said. “It was a great game, great atmosphere. They just came up with more offense then us tonight.”