It is true, the Ravens are an extremely young squad. They continue their winless streak on the year with this loss, 45-27 to Wapello, but it does not go without any important lessons. 

With no seniors and only one junior playing (Anna Torok), they could really become a more gelled team, growing stronger together in the next few seasons, especially when its most efficient scorer, Malia Yoder is only a sophomore. 

Hillcrest took their only lead of the night early in the first quarter with a two-pointer from Niva Helmuth to bring the score to 4-2. 

Helmuth, freshman, unfortunately left the game early after going up to block a shot and coming down awkwardly on her ankle. She suffered from a minor sprain and should be back in action after a few days rest. The crowd of mainly Wapello fans cheered when Helmuth stood up and left the court with the help of medical personnel.

When the Hillcrest Ravens made its way back onto the court for the second half, Helmuth walked out with her team, under her own power, to watch the second half from the bench. The crowd once again cheered for her, a sign of great sportsmanship by the Wapello Arrow fans.

After Helmuth took the lead in the first, Wapello followed with a two-pointer to tie it and then ran away with it. After one, the score was 15-4 in favor of the Arrows, a 13-0 run.

Hillcrest refused to go down without a fight, however. Each team scored nine in the second. Hillcrest had the score within eight after Yoder hit two free throws to make the score 17-9. After the quarter was over, Wapello pulled further away with a score of 24-13.

“When we were aggressive, [we were good at] getting the ball to the high post,” head coach Mitchell Drey said. “When we were able to get the ball high post with good passes off the drive, we were able to make, create shots out of it. We went way too long in between each possession of doing that though.”

Wapello used the second half to pull away. Never once were they outscored or outplayed by the Ravens. It was clear that the Arrow team played at a much faster pace than the Ravens, who just couldn’t keep up most of the time.

“Basketball’s a roller coaster game. In games, you have your high points, you have your low points going up and down. A team like Wapello, they have high points, but their low points aren’t nearly as low as what we did. We’ve got a couple minutes where, you know, Wapello didn’t play very well for a little bit, but they still look better,” Drey said. “[Wapello] just plays really good basketball and so learning from them is something we need to do.”

The Ravens never lost their smiles. This team loves to play basketball. Warming up before the game and during halftime, they were banking shots while smiling and laughing amongst themselves. 

“My [high school] coach always said that basketball for a successful team starts before you touch the court. So, if everyone’s having fun and everyone’s enjoying each other every time and spending time with each other because you’re sacrificing a lot of your time to be with these people, that basketball stuff, the work makes it easy,” Drey said. “We’ve gotten better, and everyone seems to be getting along. And that goes a lot longer than just individuals saying, you know what, we’re going to get better because we want to win. No, we want to get better and win for the girl next to us.”

The Ravens will still be searching for that all-elusive first win in a postseason matchup  on Thursday, Feb. 9 against Montezuma (17-3). 

GAME STATS

Hillcrest 27, Wapello 45

Hillcrest

      4     9        8        6    --  27

Wapello

    15     9      12       9    --  45

WAPELLO SCORING: Jacie Hoeg 13, Quinn Veach 11, Jakayla Nelson 9.

WAPELLO REBOUNDS: Nelson 10, Torrie Walker 7, Veach 6.