Regionals

The WIAA tournament is fully under way now and the regionals didn't disappoint. Have been a few upsets, one of which I was witness to but, overall the favorites have been strong.

Madison Edgewood 60 Lakeside Lutheran 51
Foul trouble was the story of this one as both teams were plagued by it. Three of Edgewood's starters were saddled with a pair of early fouls including one of their stars 6'3 junior Mandela Deang. Deang played very little in the first half and he just never got himself going throughout this one. Lakeside had not as much foul trouble but, their star 6'4 senior Cameron Kuepers battled foul trouble all game. Kuepers still got his points scoring 19 in the game but, it was on the defensive end that it was real felt. Kuepers was unable to guard Edgewood's star 6'4 senior Alex Arians and unfortunately no one could stay with Arians. Arians was able to get to the rim and score and he was hitting all of his outside shots. Arians had the highlight of the night with a baseline drive and very nice dunk. Arians had 18 in the first half before finishing with 29 for the game. Arians was just too good and that's why they won.

Madison East 82 Sun Prairie 68
Wow is all I can say as the eight seed took down the one. East was picked to go to state in the preseason for a reason East came out firing behind 6'6 junior Keshawn Justice firing threes from the outside and East jumped out to a 21 to 2 lead and never looked back. Throw in that a pair of seniors 6'6 Steve Wooten and 6'1 Cameron Cratic had their best games of the year. Wooten controlled the inside while Justice and Cratic did their thing on the outside. For Sun Prairie 6'6 freshmen Jalen Johnson had maybe one of his worst games of the season. Johnson couldn't buy a three point shot and even the layups weren't falling. Johnson did get 19 but, a lot of those were on offensive rebounds and put backs. Sun Prairie's other star 6'4 junior Marlon Ruffin struggled early on as well but, he played his heart out in this game and nearly willed his team back into the game before he ran out of gas. Ruffin couldn't hit any threes either until very late in the game and got his team within six at one point before Justice and company sealed the deal.