(Story by Stephen McDaniel)
Cabryn Klingner laid the ball up past a defender, off the glass and into the hoop for the Ankeny Centennial boys’ basketball team during the early stages of the third quarter in Tuesday’s game at Johnston.
Unfortunately for the Jaguars, Klingner’s layup ended up being their only two points of the period. A 16-0 run by Johnston ruined any hopes of a Centennial victory as the Dragons pulled away for a 53-36 win.
“We weathered the storm in the first half, and it’s a two- or three-possession game at halftime,” said Centennial coach Bob Fontana. “Third quarter, we were not good and got outscored, 18-2. Two or three times we gave them extra opportunities on the glass. Next thing you know, you’re down 12 and then they go up by as much as 20.”
The first half didn’t match the second in terms of scoring the ball. Even when surrendering a few small runs, the Jaguars kept finding ways to pull the game within a possession or two.
Centennial initially started out in a 6-0 hole before Sean Tunks kickstarted his 12-point half by sinking his first shot from beyond the arc.
Tunks hit four treys in the half, two of them during a stretch which saw the Jaguars cut an 11-point deficit down to seven.
That’s when Klingner cashed in from deep and followed it up with a second bucket to spark a 5-0 run by himself, cutting the Johnston lead to four points.
But once they came back out for the second half, the Jaguars just weren’t able to get some of those same shots to fall on the opposite end of the court.
“We had two or three turnovers that led to runouts for them, and that was the difference in the score at half,” Fontana said. “Second half, we didn’t have enough fight in us and they were the more aggressive team in the third quarter.”
Klingner scored past his defender to answer an early bucket from Johnston’s Carter Loney. But led by leading scorer Tino Daye, the Dragons started to run away with things.
Daye drew a foul after scoring at the hoop and converted his free throw for a 3-point play, which sparked a 16-0 run that allowed Johnston to build a commanding 47-24 lead.
The Jaguars’ scoring drought didn’t end until the start of the fourth quarter, when freshman Keaton Kasperbauer drained a 3-pointer for his only basket of the night.
Kolby Bechen got a shot to fall from deep and Devin Vessely knocked down a pair of 3-pointers, but the damage was already done.
“It’s not like we were turning it over,” said Fontana, whose team shot just 27.1 percent from the field (13-of-48). “We had nine turnovers in the game, we just didn’t knock down our shots and took some bad shots, which is just like turnovers.”
Tunks led the way for Centennial despite going scoreless in the second half. He went 4-of-8 from 3-point range.
Klingner chipped in seven points. Bechen and Rex Jensen each grabbed four rebounds, and Luke Mitchell added three assists and two steals.
Daye finished with 18 points for Johnston, which improved to 8-7 in the CIML Conference and 9-8 overall. Prestige Taylor had 12 points for the Dragons, and Nicare Cavil added 10.
The Jaguars’ records fell to 0-13 and 3-13.
Centennial will hit the road for another conference game on Friday at Southeast Polk, which is 1-12 in the conference and 5-12 overall after dropping a 64-56 decision at Dowling Catholic on Tuesday.
“We had a really good practice (on Monday), and it’s disappointing that it didn’t translate into a full game tonight,” Fontana said. “We’ll have to stick with it, get back to the drawing board and see if we can get better and learn from this.”
