For the second time this season, the Lone Tree Lions and Winfield-Mt. Union Wolves have split a doubleheader on the hardwood, with the Lone Tree girls taking a 57-24 win, while the WMU boys held on for a 44-36 victory.

The girls’ game was played at a lightning pace, with a just six fouls called the entire night, and a lack of dead ball situations. As a result, the two teams played start to finish in just 65 minutes. That pace benefitted the Lions a little more, who despite playing with a small 8-man roster, had more ability to run up and down the floor. The game started a bit back-and-forth, with Lone Tree struggling to finish off plays and take advantage of turnovers, but the Lions soon found their footing and pulled away from the Wolves. The score was 35-14 at the half, and the running clock took over late in the third, eventually giving Lone Tree a 57-24 victory.

After the game, Lone Tree head coach Ryan Shelman said once his team got over their slow start, they played up to his expectations. “I thought our defense was actually pretty good to start, they just hit a couple of shots, some tough ones that got some rolls, and we were able to kinda just weather that storm and then kinda took off there, and really kind of dominated the next couple quarters defensively.”

Ava Christofferson led the Lions with 21 points. Abby Zaruba, back in the starting lineup after going down with an injury a few weeks ago, scored a season-high 14. Finley Jacque also added 14. WMU was led by Madisen Kellogg’s 9. Lone Tree improves to 10-5, and 8-3 in the SEISC-North. WMU falls to 1-13, 0-11 in the conference.

The boys game, while not as quick as the girls, still saw long stretches of play without any kind of stoppage. Despite being at opposite ends of the standings, Winfield-Mt. Union had a little trouble creating separation from the Lions, who frequently stormed back after going down by multiple possessions. The contest was ultimately a low-scoring affair, with the Wolves leading just 6-2 after the first, but scoring steadily picked up over the course of the night. WMU led 17-10 at the half, saw that lead slip to 27-22 after the third, and closed out the win at 44-36.

The win was the 100th career win for Winfield-Mt. Union head coach Klay Edwards. After the game, he said the team is just a bit unlucky on offense at the moment, even if they were able to pull out the win this time around. “Well, it wasn’t pretty offensively. That’s two games in a row, where we just, we’re getting good looks, they’re just not falling for us right now. But luckily, we were pretty locked in defensively again.”

Cody Milks led the Wolves with 11, 9 of which were in the second half. Nicholas Sparrow scored all of his 10 in the second half, including two big three-pointers to widen the gap. Lone Tree’s Domonic Garcia had a stellar game despite the loss, scoring the Lions 20 of their 36 points. Winfield-Mt. Union improves to 8-3 overall, 8-1 in the SEISC-North. Lone Tree drops to 3-9, 1-8 in the conference.

Both teams will take a few days’ rest before jumping back into more doubleheader action. WMU will face Hillcrest Academy this Friday, while Lone Tree will face Wapello.