Boys basketball: Big first half sends Ottawa rolling past Mendota

OTTAWA – Ottawa coach Mark Cooper admits he has and always will have a soft spot in his heart for Mendota, his hometown and high school alma mater.

But it was pretty evident in the first half of Ottawa’s 59-32 nonconference victory over the Trojans on Saturday in Kingman Gym that his Pirates do not have that same emotional tie.

Cooper’s team came out of the gate with much respect, little empathy and firing on all cylinders, connecting on 11 of their first 14 shots from the field and grabbing leads of 13-2 in the first quarter, 24-7 in the second and 33-9 at the half.

It also outrebounded the visitors 17-5 and forced them into 23.5% shooting in the first two quarters.

Cooper Knoll led all scorers with 16 points, 11 in the first half on 5-of-5 shooting, and Payton Knoll chipped in nine points and a game-high nine rebounds for the Pirates (10-8). Aiden Mucci and Huston Hart each contributed eight points.

For the Trojans (7-15), Isaac Guzman netted a team-best nine points, while Dom Stamberger added seven points and five rebounds and Rafael Romero six points for Mendota, which rallied to a 14-7 third quarter. However, that wasn’t enough to overcome that deficit on the glass, 34% shooting and a total of 22 turnovers for the game.

“It’s nice to see a lot of old friends from there, the parents of some of the kids and people from the school,” Cooper said. “So any time we play them, there’s a sentimental element for me for the program, the school and the community which have been such a big part of my life … but while it’s an emotional attachment for me, our kids don’t care about that. They just want to play hard and win, and this turned out to be our night.

“We attacked their zone well, got higher percentage shots which helped, our hands were really active in the lane, and we were in the right spots defensively. All of those things helped us get out to a halftime lead. … Give Mendota credit, they won the third quarter and were the better team in that quarter.

“They’re a much better team that they showed tonight. It was just a good night for us.”

After Mendota’s Ryne Strouss dropped in a fast-break basket to tie the game at 2-all, the Pirates went to work. Two buckets by Cooper Knoll, the second capping an 11-0 streak, and an 18-5 run in which each of the Knolls and Trace Roether popped in a pair of shots quickly ran the Ottawa lead to 31-7.

The Pirates finished the first quarter hitting 7 of 10 shots and the half sinking 15 of 23 for 65.2%.

“We just came in without a whole lot of energy,” Mendota coach Steve Wasmer said. “We played last night, but so did they, so tired legs is no excuse. I do think in part we were not prepared, and it’s on us to have them prepared

“Ottawa is so well coached, and they execute that man offense so well, they make you make a mistake and we made a few too many in the first half. But we did pick it up in the third quarter. … We challenged them at halftime, and in the third quarter outscored them 14-7. We got together with our ball-handlers, we communicated on defense, and we were much better in the third quarter.

“We have to find a way to maintain that kind of effort the whole game to be in the game.”

With their energy level ticked up a couple of notches, the Trojans netted nine of the first 11 points of the third stanza, four on a pair of deuces by Guzman, to climb within 35-18.

A fast-break basket by Strouss cut the deficit to 38-23 late in that quarter.

But after that, they were only able to tread water. Ottawa woke up and hit 4 of their last 6 tries in the period to keep Mendota at arm’s length. Five points each from Lucas Goetz and Jack Henson helped offset a late 3-pointer from the visitors Jose Rocha.

The Pirates return to action at 7 p.m. Tuesday for an Interstate 8 Conference game at Morris, while Mendota plays at home against Bureau Valley that same night and time.