The Norwalk basketball teams hosted Pella Christian on the first night of Little Hawkeye Conference play Friday, and came away with a split. The Warrior girls rolled to a 48-27 win, while the Eagle boys held off a comeback to win 61-56.
In the girls game, Norwalk got by with relative ease in the first half, allowing just one Pella Christian bucket in the first for a 16-2 lead. A strong second quarter expanded the lead to 17 at halftime, but Pella Christian hung around in the second half to keep the final score more respectable. Norwalk head coach Jill Martin was happy with the strong start, but says there’s still work to be done to get where the team wants to be.
“It’s always great to bounce back, especially after Tuesday, the girls played great. It’s nice to open conference play with a win. We talk a lot about winning the first two minutes, the first four minutes, and we did a great job of that, but as you can tell, we need to make sure we’re playing 32 minutes.”
Ava Johnson led Norwalk with 13 points while Braelyn Clark had 10. Joslyn Terpstra had 11 to lead the Eagles. Norwalk moves to 2-1 overall and 1-0 in conference play. Pella Christian is now 1-2 overall and starts conference play 0-1.
It was all Eagles for the first quarter and a half of the boys game, as Pella Christian led by as many as 13 points in that timespan. But a spirited comeback attempt got the Warriors to within 31-25 at the break, and the race was on. The margin shrunk to four by the end of the third, and Norwalk got to within 46-45 at one point in the fourth quarter. But great 3-point shooting allowed Pella Christian to maintain the lead and hold on for the win. Eagles head coach JD Boer credits Norwalk for the battle, and was proud of his team for staying poised.
“There were a lot of moments I thought maybe we could put a run together and pull away, but give Norwalk a lot of credit. They’re a good basketball team. Redek Born had it going. Sometimes you play good defense and he just makes a shot. There’s things we’ve got to work through on both sides of the ball. I give them a lot of credit for finding a way to claw back into this one. There were big moments in this game, and I was proud of the way our team responded to each of them. I’m proud of our guys for hanging in there, the mental toughness, a lot of growth to find a way to come out on top.”
Levi Schelhaas led the way with 21 points, while Jaedon Huisman tacked on 16. Redek Born led the Warriors with 25 points. Pella Christian moves to 2-0 overall and 1-0 in the conference. They return to action Monday at PCM. Norwalk moves to 0-2 and 0-1 in conference play. They’ll host Winterset Monday.