Eagles Second Half Propels Them Past North Tama

KEOTA—The #6 ranked Keota Eagles, once again at home, found themselves one game away from the regional final. The Eagles were able to soar past the North Tama Redhawks on February 15 by a final score of 87-62. The Eagles will once again meet the Gladbrook-Reinbeck Warriors, who bested them last year in the regional final. 

In the semifinal, the Redhawks started the game red hot from behind the arc, as they pushed to a 20-17 lead behind six triples. 

The Redhawks continued to shoot the light out, as they made nine total first half threes. The Eagles found themselves down 31-29 halfway through the second quarter. They proceeded to finish the half on a 8-0 run, and take a 37-31 lead. Senior center Evan Vittetoe led the charge with 15 first half points. 

The Eagles came out in the second half with huge adjustments that led to them out-scoring the Redhawks 31-21 to push their lead to 68-52.

Senior guard Cole Kindred exposed the driving lanes and had a team high 13 points in the quarter. The senior guard ended his night with 21 points, which was the second highest total for the team. He also added nine rebounds, six assists and three steals.

Sixth man Aiden McGuire came off the bench mid-way through the quarter, and scored 10 straight points by himself. 

Vittetoe added 13 more points in the second half, and ended his night with a team high 28 points. “They worked well to get the ball inside. This is one of the few teams who we are bigger than, so it worked pretty good tonight,” said Vittetoe on what led to the big scoring effort.

Keota Head Coach Dan Stout described the game from Vittetoe with, “He really dominated in the paint, but he also was able to step outside and hit a few jumpers as well. We made an effort of getting the ball to him early, and trying to get him going. He responded.”

In total, the Eagles out-scored the Redhawks 52-31 in the second half en route to the 87-62.

Coach Stout spoke on the adjustments from his team with, “I think our defensive adjustments helped. Cole (Kindred) did a great job on (Paul) Dvorak. He came right out, and hit some shots to bust us out of our zone. He was on fire tonight, and I told the guys we have to defend him. They did just that. The 8-0 run in the second quarter was huge, then the third quarter we hammered them. Cole (Kindred) had 13 points and Aiden (McGuire) had 10 points in the stretch. It really opened things up for us, and we finished things out.”

After the game, the senior captains were asked about the prospect of a revenge game against Gladbrook-Reinbeck.

Cole Kindred started with, “We are feeling pretty good. We didn't have our best first half tonight, but we were still able to put up almost 90. We feel pretty good about it.”

Evan Vittetoe shared a similar sentiment to Kindred with, “Feels pretty good. Ready to get some revenge. We didn’t play well tonight, but we managed to get out of here with a win. So we will see what happens.”

Lastly, Sawyer Stout stated, “We are really psyched up to get them once again. Last year they were the senior dominated team, now we are the older team and they are the younger team. We are really psyched up to get the rematch.”

Coach Stout spoke on the rematch with, “They are a lot different team than we saw last year, and I think we are as well. I think our offensive firepower is a lot more than what we had last year. Their all-state guard that we struggled with graduated.” Stout jokingly added, “Glad he didn’t take fifth year.” He went on to finish it up with, “We haven’t thought about them too much yet. We will enjoy this win tonight, and start preparing tomorrow and Monday.”

The Eagles will head to Benton high school on February 20 for a rematch of the District 11: Region 6 finals from last year. They will look to enact revenge for the 77-57 loss from last season, and be crowned Regional Champions to face the winner of the #10 Kee, Lansing hosting South Winneshiek for the chance to make the state tournament.