CROSBY — Alex Morgan took care of the paint and Korey Jackson the perimeter to help the Pequot Lakes Patriots take care of the Crosby-Ironton Rangers.
The two Pequot juniors finished with 22 points each to propel Pequot to a 69-59 Mid-State Conference victory Tuesday, Dec. 17.
Morgan’s points were a bit more spread out as he tallied 12 in the first half helping Pequot to a 36-32 halftime edge. It was all Jackson to start the second half as the guard drained four 3-pointers, including a stretch of three straight, that turned a four-point lead into a 51-36 lead.
“Athletically, I feel like we can get what we want because we have a little bit of a foot-speed advantage, but we just have to execute,” Pequot head coach Rich Spiczka said. “Obviously, when the ball goes in it looks good. I think we did a lot of good things in the first half. We just didn’t put the ball in. In the second half, Korey comes out and the basket was as big as a bathtub. That always helps.”
Jackson was 6-of-8 from 3-point to go with five rebounds. Morgan added 10 points in the second half and added five boards, two assists and a steal. Morgan hit back-to-back field goals for a 61-42 Pequot edge with about nine minutes remaining.
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C-I wouldn’t go away, however, as they rattled off a 13-0 run thanks to Carter Smith who came off the bench and scored 10 points in the stretch to cut the deficit to seven.
“He gave us a lot of energy,” Rangers head coach Dave Galovich said. “Carter plays hard and he just needs to continue to play. Unfortunately last week he rolled an ankle so he missed our games on Friday and Saturday. He plays hard and brings a lot of energy. He’s a great teammate and he’s only going to get better as the season progresses.”
Morgan answered with his final basket followed by a Jackson lay-in to build Pequot’s lead back to double digits where it remained.
“I like it a lot better when we can get a lead up to 17 or 18 with about three minutes to go instead of nine,” Spiczka said. “Then everybody is thinking about running clock. I told our guys afterwards that this was a great game to have early because we got to learn a bunch of stuff. I think we wore them down a little bit. They were a little slow of feet at the end just because we were on them the whole night. We got to see some of that and we left a lot of points out there with our free throws and layups. We got to see a lot of facets and we can build from that moving forward.”
Pequot shot 50% from the field and 43% from 3-point, but just 4-of-13 from the line. The Rangers hit 40% of its shots and 15-of-20 from the line, but the undermanned and undersized Rangers, who played without an injured Jordan Oehrlein, couldn’t get out of the hole it started the second half with.
“Anytime we had a lapse defensively they would reverse the ball and knock down an open 3,” Galovich said. “They hit two or three of them in a hurry and so all of a sudden a 4-point game is now a 12 or 13-point game.
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“The other thing that hurts us is right now our depth is real thin. To try to come back from those deficits are magnified when you’re on the short end as far as depth is concerned.”
Carson Turk led the Rangers with 19 points. Smith finished with 13 points and 10 rebounds and Gabe Kramer scored 12 points, all in the first half.
Pequot opened the game with a 7-0 lead and built it to 20-14 before C-I rattled off a 12-2 run that saw Kramer and Carson Turk exchange baskets. The last seven points during the run came off of turnovers.
“It all starts defensively,” Galovich said. “You have to get stops. I can’t recall if it was off steals or what, but we were able to get a few stops and push the ball. Then you have to put the ball in the basket. When you have an open look, you have to be able to do that. I thought our kids battled real hard. We were just in a situation where we didn’t have anybody who we could throw it inside to score. That’s not a knock on any of our guys, but they’re not those types of players.”
Pequot’s Eli Laposky helped the Patriots regain the lead with a pair of 3s and Pequot closed out the half with a 5-0 run for the 4-point halftime edge.
“You could tell their guys playing on the backside of their pressure weren’t used to playing back there,” Spiczka said. “You could just tell the way we were running to the middle. Whenever Dave stands up and throws his hands in the air you know that’s something they’ve practiced at least 100 times. I always tell our kids, basketball is not complicated. It’s simple things down well over and over.”
For more photos of the game between Crosby-Ironton and Pequot Lakes go to https://bit.ly/35xySiD .
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Pequot Lakes 36 33 -- 69
Crosby-Ironton 32 27 -- 59
PEQUOT LAKES
Bode Magnuson 9, Alex Morgan 22, Korey Jackson 22, Ryan Monahan 4, Eli Laposky 8, Alex Geroy 4. FG 28-56 (50%), FT 4-13 (31%). 3-point 9-21 (43%).
CROSBY-IRONTON
Dakota Mitchell 6, Carter Smith 13, Cayden Turk 6, Carsen Turk 19, Gabe Kramer 12, Colten Turk 3. FG 20-50 (40%), FT 15-20 (75%). 3-point 4-18 (22 %).
Pequot Lakes 69, Crosby-Ironton 59
Key: A 15-4 Pequot run to start the second propelled Pequot to victory
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Conf: CI 1-1, PL 1-1
Overall: CI 4-1, PL 3-2
Next: Crosby-Ironton hosts Pierz 7:15 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 19; Pequot Lakes at Albany 7:15 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 19.
