Central City goes from 1 win to 14 (and counting) in just 2 seasons

CENTRAL CITY — You know you’ve got some dudes on your basketball team when the opponent comes out and throws a junk defense at you.

That’s what happened to Central City in its Class 1A district opener Monday night. Elkader Central played a triangle-and-two quite expertly, concentrating on stopping, or at least slowing down, sophomore point guard Matthew Klostermann and junior forward Mekhi Benton.

It worked. It worked well.

“That really shocked us all,” Klostermann said, after his Wildcats were able to overcome a halftime deficit for a 71-66 victory.

These teams played in the regular season, with Central City winning on its home court in a 91-48 blowout. The return match on that same court was close most of the way and fun to watch, quite frankly.

“Our coach told us to not overlook them even though we beat them by 40 in the regular season,” said Klostermann, who scored a team-high 15 points, mostly on aggressive drives through the lane. “But I think we still overlooked them just enough to where they came out ready to play and with a good game plan.”

Elkader Central (7-15) got beautiful games from guard Dan McGreal (26 points) and forward Elliot Kelly (22 points), taking a 33-30 halftime lead. It was a four-point Central City lead going to the fourth, and the verdict was finalized until the final two minutes.

“Credit to Central Elkader,” said Central City Coach Ryan Turner. “They came out in a triangle-and-two and really made it hard on our best kids, who we rely on a lot. We came out pretty flat, defensively in particular. We didn’t have school today, (and that) happens a lot of times when you don’t have school. But I don’t want to make an excuse for it.”

A blowout, a close call or what, Central City (14-9) won its 14th game this season, which is nine more than last season and 13 more than in 2020-21.This is just the third winning season for the Wildcats since 2010-11.

All-stater Nick Reid, now at Upper Iowa University, led Central City to 16 wins in 2019-20. This group of Cats still has a shot at that mark, but considering the team’s three leading scorers are underclassmen and there are a couple more underclassmen playing regular minutes, next season and the season after that could be really exciting around this Linn County town.

For instance, junior Daiton Price didn’t play at all in the first half Monday night, but was inserted into the lineup in the third quarter and ended up with 10 points and four boards.

“It’s always good to live (for) another one ... We’re a young team, and they’re going to have to learn that they’re going to get teams’ best shots,” Turner said.

The coach is in his first season at the school, taking over for Tanner Carlson, who is now principal at North Cedar.

“He did a lot of really, really good things with the kids,” Turner said. “People always want to give me my flowers for us winning 14 games, but we have a lot of talent. We really do. Matt Klostermann, as a sophomore, has really stepped up. Mekhi is as athletic a kid as you’ll find in 1A basketball. Aidan Klostermann is really reliable and shoots pretty much 40 percent from 3.

“So you walk into a building with kids like that, it makes it a little bit easier.”

Central City hosts Lisbon (10-12) in a second-round district game Thursday night. Though they both are in the Tri-Rivers Conference, they did not play in the regular season.

AT CENTRAL CITY

ELKADER CENTRAL (66): Gabe Erickson 3-5 1-2 8, Elliot Kelly 9-14 4-7 22, Dan McGreal 8-19 6-6 26, Caden Erickson 2-7 1-2 6, Isaac Loan 1-7 0-0 2, Tate Berns 0-0 0-0 0, Jake Hertrampf 1-2 0-0 2, Caden Fette 0-0 0-0 0, Vaughn Zittergruen 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 24-54 12-16 66.

CENTRAL CITY (71): Mekhi Benton 3-5 1-4 8, Brayden Rickels 4-6 0-0 8, Jayden Hanson 2-4 1-1 5, Aiden Klostermann 3-3 2-2 11, Matthew Klostermann 5-12 4-4 15, Castor Abernathey 3-5 0-0 6, Lucas Greif 2-5 2-4 6, Daiton Price 5-7 0-0 10. Totals 27-47 10-15 71.

Halftime - Elkader Central 33, Central City 30. 3-point goals - Elkader Central 5-20 (G. Erickson 1-2, McGreal 4-12, C. Erickson 1-2, Loan 0-4), Central City 7-16 (Benton 1-1, Rickels 0-1, Hanson 0-1, A. Klostermann 3-3, M. Klostermann 1-4, Abernathey 2-4, Greif 0-2). Rebounds - Elkader Central 26 (Kelly 9), Central City 26 (Benton 8). Total fouls - Elkader Central 15, Central City 14. Fouled out - None. Turnovers - Elkader Central 11, Central City 16.

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