By Robert Tomlinson
News Director
STURGIS — It was a doubleheader of rivalry basketball at Sturgis High School Friday night as Three Rivers took on longtime rival Sturgis in boys’ and girls’ basketball matchups.
Both teams split the matchups, with Sturgis winning the girls’ game 49-37, and Three Rivers winning the boys’ game 55-41.
Here’s what went down in both games.
Bir’s bucket barrage in third lifts Trojans to win in girls’ game
A big 20-point third quarter for Sturgis, led by a scoring barrage in the first three minutes from junior Sydney Bir, helped the Trojans stave off a late comeback from Three Rivers and win the girls’ matchup in Friday’s doubleheader.
Bir had 12 points in total on the evening, with nine coming in the third quarter alone. With the score 24-12 after a Cora Phillips lay-in 13 seconds into the quarter, she scored the next four buckets for the Trojans. She hit a short-range jumper to make it 26-12, added another bucket after two scores by Three Rivers’ Dani Glass and Jennaya Decker to make it 28-16, then hit a bucket but missed a free throw after a foul to make it 30-16, then capped off the hot streak with a three-pointer from the wing to make it 33-16.
“She had a great night. I wanted to get her the ball because she was shooting the ball really well in practice,” Sturgis head coach Andy Phillips said of Bir’s performance.
That run would help propel Sturgis to a 42-23 lead going into the fourth quarter. Three Rivers made an attempt at a comeback, however, with the Wildcats going on a 12-4 run over the first six minutes of the quarter to make it a 46-35 game, thanks to four points each from Glass and Decker, and two points each from Neiraja Reyes and Natalie McGahan.
A Decker layup with 42 seconds left in the game would make it a nine-point game at 46-37 after some wild shooting from Three Rivers on a couple possessions prior to it, but that would be as close as the Wildcats would get, as Sturgis’ Angela Cary and Addison Eicher would hit three free throws combined in the final minute to pull away and win 49-37.
“It’s easy to give up in situations like that, and we fought to the end, to the buzzer,” Three Rivers head coach Carley Shoesmith said. “We pushed them, but I think we need to come out and press a little bit more, pressure them a little bit early.”
It was Sturgis putting pressure on Three Rivers early, as the Trojans started the game on a 7-2 run, with a bucket and free throw by Cary, and four points from Madison Webb. Three Rivers would be held to just four points in the quarter – two lay-ins from McGahan – and Sturgis raced out to a 14-4 lead after one. Both teams would score eight points in the second quarter to make it 22-12 at the half, with Sturgis getting points from Bir, Webb and Phillps, and Three Rivers getting four each from Glass and Decker.
Overall, on the day, Sturgis was led by Webb, who had 13 points on the day, Bir and Cary with 12, Cora Phillips with 6, Kylie Brooks with three, Gabrielle Netke with two points, and Eicher with one free throw.
“The first half was good, I thought we missed some bunnies the first half, but this team’s resilient and has a lot of hustle. That’s how we’ve won games,” Andy Phillips said. “I was a little disappointed about that fourth quarter, it was rough and I thought we ran out of gas a little bit with our intensity – and they took advantage of it, credit to them – but we persevered.”
Three Rivers was led by Decker with 12 points, Glass with 10 points, McGahan with seven points, Reyes with four points, and Alyssa Stalker and Savannah Headley had two points each.
“Tonight, we just didn’t have it and fell short,” Shoesmith said. “Sturgis, they fought hard, they did well and made their buckets when they counted.”
Barth in double figures as Three Rivers boys win fourth game of year
After their loss to Paw Paw last week, Three Rivers boys’ head coach Brian Burg said his team needed to rebound in the second half after a three-win start.
Their 55-41 win over Sturgis Friday night, he said, could be the start of that.
“We’ve been in games; we lost to Plainwell by 10, but we had a four-point quarter. Vicksburg, we had a four-point quarter, and we left free throws, and against Paw Paw we went 9-of-34 from around the basket,” Burg said. “Now we made free throws and finished around the rim. Tonight, we made those.”
The win, their first road win at Sturgis in almost four calendar years, was thanks in part to junior center Zander Barth, who scored 14 of his game-high 15 points in the second half and came down with 10 rebounds to lead the Wildcats to victory. Burg had praise for both his big men, Barth and Maxwell Burg, who had four points and three rebounds as well.
“[Barth] and Max played really well tonight. We’re getting the ball to the big guys, and they’re finishing. That’s beautiful for us,” Burg said. “[Barth] played well when we needed to make the moment.”
Friday’s nightcap in the doubleheader was a back-and-forth contest early on. Sturgis got out to a 4-0 lead early thanks to a Gavin Lewis jumper and free throws from Carson Eicher, before Three Rivers got their first points with almost three minutes to go in the first quarter with a layup by Barth. Five straight points on a three-pointer and layup by Lukis Bir made it a 9-2 ballgame for the Trojans, and Three Rivers scored the final points of the quarter on a reverse layup by Jace Gray and a bucket by Max Burg, making it a 9-6 Sturgis lead after one.
In the second quarter, Three Rivers would go on a 6-0 run thanks to a jumper from Drake Graver, a Burg bucket and a floater from Matheus Pontes to get their first lead of the day at 12-9. A Bir three-pointer would tie the game at 12, but a layup soon after by Carter Langston would give Three Rivers a 14-12 lead, a lead they wouldn’t relinquish the rest of the way. The ‘Cats would go on a 7-3 run to end the quarter, with buckets from Lamonta Stone and Brayden Carpenter and a three-pointer from Pontes as time expired to go into the halftime break up 21-15.
Three Rivers would extend the lead to 10 at the end of the third quarter, 38-28, thanks to eight points in the quarter from Barth, six points from Blake Stewart and three from Graver. Sturgis’ scores in the quarter came from Carson Eicher, Gavyn Moore and Lewis.
However, in the fourth quarter, Sturgis would attempt to come back in the game. The Trojans started the quarter on a 6-0 run with a layup from Eicher, a jumper from Lewis and a steal-and-score from Moore to make it a 38-34 game before Three Rivers called a timeout. After that, Three Rivers would go on a 6-0 run of their own, with layups from Barth, Gray and Stone pulling Three Rivers out to a 44-34 lead.
“There were times where we got a little loose – we’re up 10, turnover, turnover, six points – but all of a sudden, we regroup and refocus,” Burg said.
Both teams would trade buckets in the final few minutes, with the Wildcats hitting 7-of-10 free throws in the waning moments to seal the victory, 55-41.
Barth’s 15 points and 10 rebounds were complemented on the day by Gray with eight points, four rebounds and four steals, six points and two rebounds each from Stone and Stewart, five points each from Pontes and Graver, and four points each from Burg and Carpenter.
Only four players for Sturgis made the scoresheet. Eicher led the way with 13 points, Bir had 11 points that included three three-pointers, Lewis had 10 points and Moore had nine points.
“Give Three Rivers credit, they had a very good defensive gameplan, and I didn’t do enough to get the guys in the right position,” Sturgis head coach Keith Kurowski said. “We had trouble with their press and had trouble playing against their half-court extended trapping zone. We didn’t hit enough shots, we didn’t get to the foul line enough, we didn’t get out of transition, and we had too many turnovers.”
Robert Tomlinson can be reached at 279-7488 or robert@wilcoxnewspapers.com.
