Explosive third quarter lifts Thunder past Lions
RILEY GONZALES/THE FORUM
Nodaway Valley sophomore Tye Hoyt handles the ball on Monday night against St. Joseph Christian in Albany.
ALBANY, Mo. — The Class 2, District 16 bracket is filled with tough competition — conference champions Princeton, Gallatin and Nodaway Valley to name three as the tournament tips off in Albany.
In Monday’s matchup, the Thunder faced a highly-talented and tough opponent in St. Joseph Christian. The two teams met just last week as Nodaway Valley got the best of the Lions in a clash that ended 70-59. Nodaway Valley was victorious again this time 62-50.
After the tip-off, the St. Joseph Christian started the scoring with a 3-pointer before Thunder freshman Braxton McGinness was fouled and hit one of his free throws. After another Lions basket, sophomore Tye Hoyt went to the line and hit all 3 of his free throws — that was answered by Christian with 8-straight points. Before the end of the quarter, the Thunder were able to pick up six more points including a basket by senior Lane Larabee off a nice dish from McGinness. Freshman Jax Cowden added two baskets. The quarter was concluded by a two-pointer from the Lions.
“We knew they were gonna come out with a fight,” McGinness said. “They have a lot of seniors so they wanted to win this game badly.”
Going into the second quarter, the Thunder would be down by five. The entire second quarter was back and forth with the most consecutive points only being five. McGinness got an easy 2-point bucket to tie it, but the Lions responded with a crucial 3-pointer to take the lead back nearing the end of the quarter. McGinness would again score to cut the lead to 25-24 at halftime.
With the Lions in the lead, Nodaway Valley not only needed to fight against the players on the court, but also the intense energy from the crowd.
“Once the crowd gets into it, you just get fired up,” Hoyt said. “It gets wild.”
Starting the second half, both teams would go bucket-for-bucket with the Lions being in the lead until the Thunder started ripping through the Christian defense going on a 16-2 run to take the lead 44-33.
“We needed to get in there, crash the boards, and do what we could and start knocking down our shots,” Hoyt said.
To make it happen, the Thunder spread the wealth, having four different scorers — Cowden, junior Tyler Gray, McGinness, and Hoyt — to help take over the game. Nodaway Valley also held the Lions to only eight points scored in the third quarter while they scored 20.
“I’d love to take credit for it at halftime but it’s really nothing I said, it was just a matter of us working our offense by design,” Nodaway Valley coach Shawn Emerson said.
After a free throw to start the fourth for the Lions, McGinness and Hoyt helped the Thunder extend their lead by going on a 9-2 run. Gray would hit a free throw which was quickly answered by another Christian basket.
The game would heat up as both teams were scoring when they had the ball. Ultimately, the Lions effort wasn’t enough as two free throws from McGinness sealed the deal with the Thunder beating the Christian, 62-50.
McGinness and Hoyt impressed with a combined 40 points, McGinness having 24 and Hoyt having 16, an impressive performance compared to the last outing against the Lions.
“That’s the good part about our team, when both of them scored four or five points (against the Lions) the rest of our team picked them up,” Emerson said. “And tonight when they were crashing down on the post, sagging on Jax, Tyler and Preston, you saw Tye hitting those shots in the corner and Braxton getting to the basket.”
The Thunder won’t have much rest time as they are set to face Gallatin in the district semifinals on Wednesday in Albany.
“We know they are a really good two seed, probably the best in class 2,” McGinness said. “We know it’s gonna be a tough battle, they could have been one seed, we wanna come back and beat them.”
“They’re a really good team, solid, we just got to play some lockdown defense, get the boards, and hit our shots again,” Hoyt said.
Emerson is focused on his team going into the semifinal.
“For us, just continue what we do, continue getting the ball inside,” Emerson said. “Continue to rebound and try to get stops on defense, it’s gonna be a really good matchup.”
