Norwalk’s valiant second-half comeback fell a basket short on Monday night as the Warrior boys basketball team lost to Class 4A 8th-ranked Ankeny 66-64 in an entertaining non-conference game heard live on 94.3 KNIA.

Norwalk led for much of the first half and scored the first bucket of the second half to go ahead 33-32, but it was their last lead of the night. Ankeny responded with a 9-0 run and held off every Warrior challenge the rest of the way. Norwalk cut a 60-51 deficit to 63-62 in the final four minutes, but the Hawks made enough free throws down the stretch to win their fifth straight game and finish the regular season at 15-6.

The Warriors, who learned earlier Monday that they will be the No. 3 seed in Class 4A, Substate 2 behind West Des Moines Valley and Council Bluffs Thomas Jefferson, dropped to 15-4 overall. Norwalk head coach Aaron Pelzer tells KNIA/KRLS Sports that a couple of short scoring lulls during the night proved costly.

“We don’t have the luxury against these really good teams to have that minute-and-a-half or two-minute stretch where they go 6-0 on us,” he said. “It just makes it really, really tough for us to fight back.” Pelzer added, ‘Like I told the guys – tonight was going to be a big boy game and if we weren’t tough we were going to get exposed. I was proud of how hard we played and how tough we were and how tough we fought down the stretch to… at least give us a shot.”

Each team’s senior star showed up big time as Norwalk’s Redek Born and Ankeny’s Carson Johnson both made four 3-pointers, tough mid-range shots and a combined 23 free throws. Born finished with a career-high 39 points for the Warriors, Aidan Harder scored 10 and Tim Koerselman added seven. Johnson scored 30 for the Hawks and 6-foot-6 senior Cade Pederson more than tripled his season average with 15 points in the paint.

Norwalk returns to action tonight for a 7:15 contest at Class 3A 4th-ranked ADM.

BOWLING:

The Norwalk girls bowling team finished their season on Monday by placing sixth out of eight schools in the Class 2A State Qualifying Tournament at Oskaloosa’s Statesmen Lanes. 

The Warriors totaled 2,010 pins in the 15-round Baker games, averaging a 134. During the individual competition, Norwalk junior Julia Palen placed 16th overall with a three-game series of 475 and also had the team’s high game with a 186. Additional series scores for Norwalk included Ellery Racz with a 409, Elivia Stout 388 and Anna Curran 360.