Golden Tornado pushes past Mustangs

Coffeyville Field Kindley High’s Golden Tornado ripped through the Iola High’s Mustangs Friday night in Southeast Kansas League play.
The Mustangs came out battling in their SEK opener and homecoming contest. They even led by four midway through the first quarter. They were down four at the halfway mark of the second period.
Iola was still in the game.
Coffeyville’s quickness and size took over and powered the ‘Nado to a 61-38 win.
“We played a good quarter of basketball. We’re not able to match their play tonight. We have a lot to get better at,” said Bill Peeper, Mustang head coach.
“We allowed them two, three and four attempts at the basket. We didn’t rebound very well tonight.”
The loss put Iola at 0-1 in SEK play and 7-6 overall.
“We have to do a better job of handling the basketball than we did tonight. I thought we could do a better job against their quickness but we didn’t,” Peeper said.
Clint Heffern rattled home a three-pointer to open Iola’s scoring in the game. Jerrik Sigg had a conventional three-point play and Iola led 6-4 with 6:24 left in the first quarter.
Coffeyville pushed ahead with four straight points. Levi Ashmore tied it for Iola. DeMarko Carr got a putback for Coffeyville and that was counter by a bucket from Iola’s Braden Larson.
With it knotted a 10-all, Iola got a four-point possession. Larson was fouled, hit one of two free throws. On the second miss, Iola teammate Christian Kauth got the rebound and made pass to Larson.
Larson scored, was fouled and hit the free throw. Iola was up 14-10. But not for long as Coffeyville got three of those points back in the same manner.
That triggered a 10-2 run by the Golden Tornado. Coffeyville was up 20-16 at the conclusion of the first quarter.
The Mustangs stayed with it as Larson scored the first basket of the second stanza. Coffeyville pushed the tempo to its liking and outscored Iola 12-6 in the period for a 32-22 halftime lead.
Coffeyville kept dictating the pace of the game in the second half. The Golden Tornado rolled on a 17-6 surge in the third period.
Coffeyville finished the game on a 17-10 run.
“We got to play a lot people tonight. They got their opportunity to go in and show us what they can do,” Peeper said.
“I thought Corey Taylor came off the bench and did a good job for us. Corey hustled on the court and had four steals.
“Also Jarred Latta gave us a good effort on the boards. He led us with nine rebounds.”
Larson was Iola’s leading scorer with 12 points plus he had five rebounds. Heffern had four assists.
Peeper said the Mustang defense did have several times that it forced Coffeyville “to shoot over us not allowing them to get past us but still we gave up two or three shots on a possession.”
Coffeyville had a balanced scoring attack with 10 players putting in two or more points. James Newton led the way with 10 with James Jones added nine.
Three other players had eight point each and one had seven.
Iola lost the junior varsity game 66-38. Tyler Powelson score 10 for Iola and Trent Latta had seven.
The Mustang freshmen won 58-54. Kaden Macha fired in 17 points and Isaiah Grover added 14,
Iola travels to Chanute Tuesday in a SEK contest.
Iola (16-6-6-10-38) (FG/3-pt): Heffern 0/2-2-3-8, Ashmore 1-4-0-6, Coons 0-0-2-0, Bossell 1-2-1-4, J. Latta 1-1-1-3, Sigg 1-1-1-3, Taylor 1-0-1-2, Larson 5-2-4-12, Kauth 0-0-2-0, T. Latta 0-0-1-0. TOTALS: 10/2-12-16-38.
Coffeyville (20-12-17-17-61) (FG/3-pt): Williams 0-0-3-0, Marshall 3-2-2-8, Lewis 3-2-1-8 Hershey 1-0-1-2, J. Jones 2/1-2-0-9, Mitchell 1-1-1-3, Knight 2-0-3-4, Carr 4-0-3-8 E. Jones 1-0-0-2, Newton 4-2-2-10, Nelson 2-3-4-7. TOTALS: 22/1-12-20-61.