South O’Brien came up just short against an excellent Remsen St. Mary’s team. The Hawks held off a rally by the host team to get a 69-62 victory over the Wolverines February 4 at Paullina. The narrow loss dropped South O’Brien to 13-6 on the season.
“I thought we played very well against a state-ranked team,” remarked Wolverine head coach Kiley Yates “We got down 17 in the third quarter and fought back to close it to four late in the game. We played well defensively and they made a number of guarded shots. We ran good offense and scored the ball at a high rate.” The Wolverines had lost by 26 points to St. Mary’s early in the season.
The balanced South O’Brien scoring showed Boston Riedemann with 12 points, Ben Woodall with 11, Willie Conley and David Bottjen each with 10, Derek Paulsen with eight, Hudson Oolman with six and Sawyer Honkomp with five. That balance showed up in the assist column as well with three assists from both Riedemann and Honkomp, two apiece from Woodall, Conley and Bottjen and one from Oolman.
The Wolverines converted 19 of 56 field goal tries to shoot 34 percent. They were 8-of-30 from behind the three-point line and 16-of-21 at the charity stripe. St. Mary’s was 22-of-42 from the field for 52 percent. The Hawks nailed six of 17 trey attempts and 16 of 21 free throws.
Honkomp and Bottjen each came away with four steals. St. Mary’s committed 16 turnovers. The Wolverines turned the ball over 13 times. South O’Brien finished with a 30-26 edge on the boards. Oolman claimed six rebounds, Woodall five, Conley four and Riedemann, Honkomp and Dain Moermond three each.
RSM 17 11 19 22 – 69
S. O’Brien 14 8 19 21 – 62