Regional Final Day

Yesterday I was able to take in three regional final games. Started the day off in Baraboo watching Wisconsin Dells verse River Vally, then headed to Madison to watch Memorial and Sauk Prairie, and ended the night in Waunakee with their match up against Madison Lafollette. Division one regional finals can hardly be called regional finals because it's still only a second round match up and in some cases it may be that D1s first game of the playoffs, either way all teams have two games left after Saturdays games. Since I saw three games in one day I'm only go to do a short summary of each game.

Wisconsin Dells 59 River Valley 56
This was an extremely physical game which is the way Wisconsin Dells likes to play. Dells was led by their star 6'0 senior Jade Royston who is playing out of his mind right now in the playoffs. Royston was unstoppable for the first three quarters before Dells decided to just hang on to the lead and not extend it at the end. Wisconsin Dells was up 12 points with about 2:30 left in the game and that's when Wisconsin Dells stopped playing and let River Valley back into the game. The Dells weren't hitting their free throws and a couple three point shots and drives to the basket and River Valley had tied the game at 56 with four seconds remaining and were looking towards overtime when Royston took the inbounds pass and pulled up from half court to bank in the game winning shot.

Top Players
Jade Royston 6'0 senior Wisconsin Dells- Mr. Everything for the Dells right now, can score at will, whether he's in the post, shooting the three, penetrating, or apparently from half court.
Jimmy Alvin 6'0 senior Wisconsin Dells- Very good spot up shooter that knocked down three, three pointers, as well as adding five free throws.
Noah Baryenburch 6'0 sophomore River Valley- Leader of the team goes to his left very strong and has a nice floater that he uses to score most of his points and can knock down the three.
Alex Richard 6'4 sophomore River Valley- Very tough player that scores on the inside and knocked down a pair of big three pointers late in the game.

Top Scorers
WD- Royston 28 Alvin 14 Nate Gibson 7
RV- Baryenburch 20 Richard 17 Craig Johnson 6

Madison Memorial 47 Sauk Prairie 38
Madison Memorial came out extremely flat and missed a lot of easy shots and then got into foul trouble which kept the game much closer then most people thought. The strong play of Madison Memorial 6'7 senior Jeronne Maymon was just too much for the undersized Sauk team. The most impressive player of the game though was Sauk Prairie's 6'2 senior Garret Schwarz who was unstoppable in this game. Memorial did not have a defender that could stay infront of Schwarz as he was able to score at will or get fouled where he would convert from the line.

Top Players
Jeronne Maymon 6'7 senior Madison Memorial- Didn't have a great game but, kept playing hard getting offensive rebounds and getting second chance points.
Russell Henderson 6'0 senior Madison Memorial- Came off the bench and had another big game. When Memorial was struggling against Sauk's zone Henderson had two three pointers and penetrated and found Maymon for a basket.
Garrett Schwarz 6'2 senior Sauk Prairie- Pretty much said it all just unstoppable today.

Top Scorers
MM- Maymon 15 Henderson 8 Junior Lomomba 8
SP- Schwarz 24 Drew Carden 6 Chad Pings 4

Waunakee 67 Madison Lafollette 56
Lafollette came out as usual, really looking to push the ball which led to them being a bit out of control and taking some wild shots that weren't falling for them. Waunakee on the other hand looked very solid and handled the Lafollette intensity very well which led to a big early lead for Waunakee. Lafollette continued to push the ball which eventually led to some open shots and when Waunakee began missing shots and turning the ball over Lafollette began dropping the threes. In the end though Lafollette's shooting went cold and Waunakee was able to hold on to the win.

Top Players
Mitch Roelke 6'0 senior Waunakee- I love this kid as a point guard. Handled the Lafollette pressure pretty well, had a couple of very nice no look passes, and pounds the glass pretty well for a guard.
Jason Paulson 6'4 senior Waunakee- Size really gave Lafollette a lot of problems on the offensive end and hit two big threes that were unexpected.
Chris Redman 6'3 senior Madison Lafollette- Does a great job of grabbing the rebounds and was main reason Lafollette crawled back into the game with some big threes.

Top Scorers
W- Roelke 13 Zach Ripley 13 Paulson 10 Eric Helt 10
ML- Redman 16 Marcus Henley 11 DJ Fuller 9

In the next couple days I'll be doing my predictions for sectionals for next weekend as there are only two rounds left until state starts.