12-05-03
RED HILL @ EFFINGHAM ST. ANTHONY
BY JACK BULLOCK
EFFINGHAM - After last weeks self-stated 'sub-par' showing in its own Thanksgiving tourney, Effingham St. Anthony couldn't wait to get back on the floor on Friday night for their Homecoming game.

Using some smothering at times defensive pressure and Mike Wines' five 3-pointers, St. A posted a commanding 65-39 win over winless Red Hill.

Allowing the Salukis just four fourth quarter points, the Bulldogs improved to 4-2 overall.

"We had a couple of bad spurts tonight and committed some turnovers, but other than that I was pretty pleased with the way we played," said St. Anthony coach Ron Niebrugge, whose team committed 86 turnovers in five games the previous week. "The kids fought hard tonight and it was a nice win for us."

Jumping on Red Hill from the opening tap, St. A raced out to a 14-2 advantage.

Jordan Koerner, St. Anthony's junior guard, scored six opening quarter points. His rebound bucket with 4:18 left made it 6-2 Bulldogs.

After Jeff Ungrund hit a shot in close for St. A, Koerner scored on 'back-to-back' trips.

His rebound basket was followed by a steal and fast break lay up that pushed the Bulldog lead to 12-2.
Doug Wohltman's score in the paint made it 14-2 St. A.

Red Hill's Brandon Christy scored eight points in the final minute of the first quarter in the teams' first run of the night.

He capped off the run with a pair of 3-pointers to bring the Salukis to within 17-10.

However everytime Red Hill made a move, St. Anthony would counter.

Wohltman helped the Bulldogs get rolling in the second frame as he hit a pair of free throws and then made a steal, one of St. A's five in the first half.

He finished the play by racing to the basket for another easy lay in and a 25-12 Bulldog lead.

With the lead stretched out to a 30-12 advantage, St. Anthony let their guard down for a moment and Red Hill produced their best minutes of the night to finish out the half.

Christy and Brady Decker struck again, followed up by two baskets by Ryan Nicholson in the paint to cap a 14-4 quarter ending run to cut the margin to 35-26 at intermission.

"We would make a run and they would comeback and make a run also and we could never get close enough," said Red Hill coach Bryan Havill. "The kids played hard tonight. I liked our effort. We made a lot of dumb mistakes and we missed a lot of shots and you can't do that against good teams."

Christy gave the Red Hill crew a bit more hope to start the third quarter as he slashed to the basket for the first points of the second half to cut the St. A lead to 35-28.

However at this point, Mike Wines made his presence known in a big way.

On three straight possesions, Wines showed his range by hitting three consecutive 3-point shots.

One from the right corner, one from the left corner and one from straight away all found the bottom of the net.
Red Hill at this point found themselves at the bottom of a 44-28 score.

The Salukis made one final stab at cutting the lead with Eric Adamson, Decker and Christy scoring the games next seven points. Christy's 'top of the arc' 20-footer cut the lead back down to 44-35.

But the Bulldogs would deliever the 'knockout' blow by scoring the final four points of the third quarter and 10 of the first 12 points of the final stanza.

Wines scored twice late in the run on a turn around shot in the lane followed by another 3-pointer.

His shots were sandwiched around a Matt Dust drive to the basket.

Koerner scored driving down the middle of the lane while being fouled by Nicholson. When his foul shot went threw the net, St. Anthony led 59-37.

"We just didn't have enough left in the fourth quarter after having to come from behind so many times," added Havill, whose club is now 0-5 on the season.

Wines led all scorers with 19 points. Koerner added 14 and Wohltman pitched in 10 and Ungrund had eight.

Christy scored 16 and Decker put in 11 points for Red Hill.

	1	2	3	4		Final
Red Hill1	10	16	09	04	-	39
St. Anthony	17	18	14	16	-	65

Red Hill (39) - Nicholson 6, Decker 11, Christy 16, Adamson 6.
2FG-12, 3FG-4, FT-3-8, PF-19
St. Anthony (65) - Semple 6, Bohnhoff 2, Koerner 14, Wohltman 10, Dust 2, B. Koester 2, Baker 2, Wines 19, Ungrund 8.
2FG-17, 3FG-8, FT-7-14, PF-13.