The Pella Christian girls basketball team continued their hot start while the Eagles boys couldn’t close an early gap against a potential 2A state tournament team in the opening doubleheader of 2020-21 against Albia. The Eagles girls won 66-30, while the boys fell 74-67 against the Blue Demons Tuesday, as heard on the KRLS2 stream.

Pella Christian’s girls largely dominated the evening’s opener against Albia, never trailing in the contest, as they were propelled by a 24-4 third quarter that pushed the home team into continuous clock territory.

Emma Witzenburg spurred the 3rd quarter offensive explosion for P.C., scoring 15 of her 20 points in the game in the second half, and Allison Van Gorp added 17 points and 11 rebounds.

In the nightcap, despite an early 5-3 Eagles’ lead, Albia showed off their talented senior scoring duo of Blake Chance and Brayden Messamaker — Chance dropped 21 of his 32 points in the first 16 minutes, and Messamaker tallied 19 of his 22 points in the final two quarters to keep Pella Christian at arms’ length for the majority of the contest.
Pella Christian brought the game to within six points twice in the 4th quarter, but couldn’t string enough possessions together to close the gap.

The Eagles were led by a 10 point, 15 rebound double-double from Eric Mulder, 11 points from older brother Luke, and 10 points from Bennett Spronk (Sprunk), and Pella Christian finished with six players scoring eight points or more.

Pella Christian’s girls are 2-0, and the boys stand at 0-1; both are on the road to Norwalk this Friday, a game that can be heard on 92.1 KRLS.