Pella Christian never trailed in a 54-32 class 2A substate victory over Des Moines Christian Saturday night in Pleasantville, punching a ticket to the boys state basketball tournament in a game heard live on 92.1 KRLS.

The Eagles avenged an 11-point loss to the Lions from just over a month ago by suffocating DMC’s leading scorer Adam Witty. The senior averaged better than 22 points per game this season, but scored just two Saturday night on a late field goal. PC’s Aiden Stoltz and Tysen DeVries took turns guarding Witty man-to-man, while the rest of J.D. Boer’s club settled into a zone.

“They’re a tough matchup because Witty is really good in the middle of the floor, and sometimes in a zone you can give that up a little bit. So we decided to play the zone and just guard Witty. It worked out really well because our guys executed phenomenally, and it helps when you can have 6’9″ (Eric Mulder) at the rim who’s changing a lot of shots, blocking a few and rebounding everything.”

Mulder scored 12 points and grabbed 12 rebounds, while Levi Schelhaas (15) and DeVries (11) combined to score 26. The Eagles won the rebounding battle 33-21, prevented second chance opportunties for the Lions, and shot better than 60% themselves.

Pella Christian improves to 18-6 on the season and earned the fourth seed in the class 2A state tournament. They will play fifth-seeded Roland Story at 7:15 on Monday night, March 7th at Wells Fargo Arena.

Eagle fans can order state tournament t-shirts up until noon on Monday, February 28th through BSN sports by clicking here.