Lions move on

(Above) It was a battle of the bigs, as Clear Lake’s Jared Penning puts up a shot.  -Reporter photos by Chris Barragy

Clear Lake beats West Delaware, 61-46

by Marianne Gasaway

The Clear Lake Lions advanced to the Class 3A State semi-finals with a 61-46 win over West Delaware, Manchester Tuesday afternoon at Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines.  The victory was the first at State for the boys program.

The Lions (24-0) will meet top-seeded Norwalk at 2 p.m. Thursday.  Norwalk and its standout junior guard Bowen Born flew past Ballard in a rematch of a November game that Ballard (15-10) won, racking up an 81-39 victory that included 40 points for Born. The 42-point final margin on Tuesday was the largest in a 3A quarterfinal since 2007.

The Lions led throughout their game with West Delaware, but sealed the deal with a 12-6 advantage in the fourth quarter.

Clear Lake freshman Carson Toebe was not intimidated by the big stage.  Toebe got the Lions on the board first with a three-pointer just over one-minute into the game.  He followed that with a lay-up for a 5-0 lead.

Toebe hit three treys to help the Lions to a 20-11 lead after one quarter.  He scored 14 in the first half and finished with 16 in the game.

Drew Enke also drained a three on his way to nine first-half points.  He was the top scorer for the Lions with 22 points in the game.

Clear Lake led by as many as 11 in the first half before West Delaware went on a 7-0 run to pull within four with 6:26 remaining in the second quarter.

But the Lions quickly squashed the Hawks’ hopes.

Senior Tate Storbeck put the ball in to make the score 27-21 and Jack Barragy hit from behind the arc to push it to 30-21.  Enke scored twice in the final seconds of the first half for a 35-24 halftime score.

In the second half, the Lions pushed their lead to as many as 15 with more three-pointers by Enke, along with strong play inside from senior Jared Penning.  The 6’7” Penning had one of his best games with six points on three-for-three shooting and two rebounds.

Storbeck finished with six points.  Jaylen DeVries had four points and a team-high seven rebounds.  Jack Barragy put in three points, while Andrew Formanek and Kody Kearns scored two points apiece.

As a team, the Lions made 46.7 percent of their shots (21/45) and connected on 43.8 percent of three-point attempts (7/16).

Clear Lake dominated in the paint, out-scoring West Delaware 16-1 in second chance points.  They also made the most of the Hawks’ 13 turnovers, outscoring them 22-10.

Logan Woellert led the Hawks with 11 points, while Derek Krogmann had 10.