By Mike Moll, WKTV Sports Director
sports@wktv.org
The boys basketball District opener for Division 1 played at Caledonia High School showcased the true meaning of March Madness. OK Red foes East Kentwood and Caledonia split their regular season meetings with a win apiece and Monday was just as even. So much so that it not only went into overtime, but double overtime before the Falcons would advance to Wednesday with a 68-67 victory.
Caledonia finishes the season at 9-12 while East Kentwood, now 12-9, will face one of the area’s top teams, the 19-2 Wyoming Wolves at Middleville T-K, after Wyoming defeated the host Trojans Monday, 93-49.
EK would score the first basket of the game, but the Scots then went on a 9-0 run, and finish with a 14-9 lead after the first quarter buzzer. The Falcons leading scorer on the season, Ja’moni Jones would lead all scorers with 5, followed by Caledonia’s Luke Thelen with 4, along with Koby VanderWoude and Carter Thomas with 3.
While the Fighting Scots would hit an early 3-pointer by Thelen to take a 17-11 lead, the Falcons would quickly come back with the next six, led by the combination of Jones and Jordan Jackson to tie the game at 17, which was the second of twelve ties on the night. Caledonia would outscore East Kentwood 8-6 the remainder of the quarter to hold a slim 25-23 lead. Jones would lead the way with 11 and Jackson had 8, six of which were in the second quarter, while Caledonia was being paced by Thelen with 9.
The intensity would continue after halftime, as East Kentwood would take their second lead of the night 32-30 following back to back offensive rebounds by Urim Sahitolli and his made basket at the 3:35 mark. However, the Scots would score the final five points of the stanza, with the last being another triple by Thomas to head into the fourth with a 35-32 lead. Jones was still the leading scorer with 13 and Caledonia’s Thomas had 10 followed by Thelen with 9.
Caledonia would open the fourth with a basket by VanderWoude, who would have twelve in the quarter by himself, but the parade to the charity stripe would begin for East Kentwood as they would hit four in a row to cut the deficit to just one, until Jackson would connect at the 6:10 mark to mark the fourth of six total lead changes on the night, 38-37 East Kentwood. That was the start of the Falcons trying to take control of the game as they would increase their lead to 47-40, but simply couldn’t shake Caledonia, who would keep fighting being led by VanderWoude and Andrew Larson. After a foul by Caledonia with just 10.7 seconds remaining, Jones went to the line for two shots that could have given EK a three-point lead, but he went 1-for-2 to make it 53-51. Caledonia had a shot blocked but was able to get the offensive rebound by Thelen who scored with 1.7 seconds remaining. On the ensuing in-bounds pass, Jones tossed a shot from half court that was no good to send the game into the first overtime.
The OT was controlled by EK early as Ja Shon Large, who had 5 points in regulation, scored the first four, but that lead was cut to one after a 3-pointer by Larson. After another Large score, the next three were scored by Caledonia’s Aaron Henry and VanderWoude, but he too missed one of two free throws. EK’s Kalil Strange would make it 61-59, but with 41.1 seconds left, Caledonia’s Thelen would knot it again at 61 where it would stay, and a second overtime was needed.
As so often is the case, free throw shooting is the difference in back and forth games and this was no exception in the second OT as EK would make 3-of-4, all by Strange, whereas the Scots would be 2-of-4 on their last two trips down the floor, but that was good enough to take a 67-66 lead with 21.5 seconds left. After a series of timeouts, EK’s Large would make a driving basket with just .9 seconds remaining, after which Caledonia could only get a shot off as the buzzer sounded trying to force a foul but to no avail.
Caledonia was led by VanderWoude with 21, Thelen 13, and both Thomas and Larson with 11, but the Scots were 7-of-15 from the charity stripe. The Falcons were led by Jones with 23, Large and Jackson 13 each, and Strange 9, but the victory went to them by hitting 15-of-21 from the strip on the night as a team.
