Reedsburg upsets Wisconsin Dells in Round One

This game was an upset on paper but, in reality this game wasn't much of an upset. Yes Wisconsin Dells was the three seed and Reedsburg the sixth but, in the regular season Reedsburg had beaten the Dells and everyone that follows high school basketball was picking Reedsburg. Another thing to factor in was that Reedsburg had really under achieved this year, at least in my eyes. They had two solid wing players in 6'3 junior Chad Mazur and 6'2 senior Jordan VanCleave and a pretty solid big man in 6'6 senior Jon Stolte but, they just couldn't get everyone going at the same time and get things rolling.

Reedsburg jumped out early and never trailed throughout the entire game. Dells came out very flat early on while Reedsburg was looking very sharp and much better then the previous time I had seen them. VanCleave looked very sharp in the first half as he was able to find his shooting range from about 15 feet and was able to knock down some mid range jumpers. Dells was hurt by some foul trouble early on as their defensive specialist 6'0 senior Bobby Blaschke picked up two early fouls in the first quarter and may of picked up a third before half, can't recall if that's correct though. 6'9 senior Nate Gibson also picked up two early fouls which caused him to sit a good portion of the first half. Meanwhile Dells star 6'5 senior Justin Ward really struggled to find his range. The fouls and cold shooting led to a Reedsburg halftime lead of 27-17. Reedsburg got a nice shot in the arm from their bench when 6'3 junior Ryan Pawlisch came in and knocked down a couple of three point shots. In the second half Wisconsin Dells was able to claw back in to the game by knocking down the three point shot. The hot shooting was led by 5'9 freshmen MJ Delmore who hit three, three points in the second half while four other players hit at least one shot from behind the arc. In the end though Reedsburg was able to hang on knocking down just enough free throws to get the one point win, 49-48. Ward hit a three with about 30 seconds or so left to make it a one point game and then Reedsburg missed the free throw. Dells called timeout and inbounded the ball with a little under 20 seconds left but, looked very disorganized and never got a good look at the hoop or into Ward's hand and had to settle for a double pump heave from Delmore at the buzzer.

Top Players
M.J. Delmore 5'9 freshmen Wisconsin Dells- Delmore looked much more sure of himself in this game and did a nice job of running the point. Played the entire game and hit those three big threes in the second half.
Shane Wimann 6'2 freshmen Wisconsin Dells- Would never guess he's a freshmen. Another kid that played the entire game and did a solid job guarding VanCleave and dominated the boards.
Jordan VanCleave 6'2 senior Reedsburg- Was MVP of the game as he was money from midrange really looked to score in this game.
Chad Mazur 6'3 junior Reedsburg- Didn't have a great game but, did have a nice little run in the second quarter and knocked down the free throws late in the game.

Box Score
WD- Ward 13 Delmore 11 Wimann 9 Gibson 9 Blaschke 3 Kyle Stowers 3 Josh Elftman 0
Reedsburg- VanCleave 16 Mazur 14 Stolte 10 Pawlisch 9 Kevin Sorenson 0 Mark Hollendyke 0 Jared Park 0 Durrell Naquin 0

Judging by who the top players were for Wisconsin Dells the future is very bright. Dells has a very strong freshmen class as they have two starting on varsity this year and one off the bench who didn't play this game, and then most of the JV team is freshmen as well. I'd say two years Dells will be a very good team and may be making a state push. As for Reedsburg, I've been a believer in them since before the season started and believe that they could beat Prairie du Chien in the next round and could make a push to sectionals. With the way the season has gone though they just as easily could be blown out in the next game.