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Top-10 matchup of Class 3A boys basketball teams goes the way of Cedar Rapids Xavier
No. 8 Saints brush past No. 7 Dubuque Wahlert at home, 57-53
Jan. 20, 2026 11:15 pm, Updated: Jan. 21, 2026 1:14 am
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CEDAR RAPIDS - The topic of this discussion is free throws.
Yeah, yeah, you are about to quit reading already. Free throws aren’t sexy.
It’s dunks and 3-pointers that are the shiznit. Kids go out for pregame warmups and hoist a bunch of shots from beyond the arc.
Maybe a couple head to the free-throw line to practice them. Just the way it is in today’s basketball.
But ...
“Absolutely free throws are important,” Cedar Rapids Xavier guard Lorenzo Pino said after his Class 3A eighth-ranked used them to beat No. 7 Dubuque Wahlert, 57-53, Tuesday night at Xavier’s Ron Thillen Gymnasium. “Coach (Mike) Freeman stresses them all the time. We have specific times in practice where we just shoot free throws. So it’s a big part of our team, for sure.”
Pino made six straight charity shots in the final 1:40 to help Xavier (9-4) hang on for this Mississippi Valley Conference win over a parochial rival. Each time they extended the lead from two to four points.
His final pair came with 3.3 seconds left and provided the final score. Pino ended up leading the Saints with 14 points.
Xavier has rebounded with two wins in a row after dropping three of its previous four games.
“I think a class win is always big. A Valley win is even bigger,” Freeman said. “I told the boys the other night that sometimes in our world, we don’t give enough credit to wins. Everybody thinks you should win by 40 or 30, but it’s like winning is really hard. That’s why a lot of teams don’t do it.
“So really happy. We had to fight through some things tonight. I told the team that we’ve got to start to ascend, and I felt like we ascended a little bit. We’ve still got a lot of things to clean up, but I thought we were doing some better things.”
Xavier won despite off-shooting nights from its two top scorers guard Zander Murray and center A.J. Evans. They scored 10 points apiece but went a combined 7 of 24 from the field.
Sophomore Andrew Allen came off the bench to splash three 3-points and score 11 points. This was truly a team victory and a big victory.
“Oh, man, you have no idea,” Pino said. “These last few practices were rough. We were getting after it. We knew what we had to do to win. So it feels good, feels good to be back in the win column.”
“Our bench gave us a lot of help, and we needed it tonight,” Freeman said. “Lorenzo was sick the last two days, we’ve been battling with some flu. So really proud of the way they performed. If we are going to make a run at all, we’ve got to have contributions from everybody.”
Peter Wedewer led Wahlert (8-4) with 16 points, including four 3-pointers. Alex Tanny added 12 points and seven rebounds.
Both of these schools regularly make postseason runs in large part because they play a plethora of Class 4A schools as members of the MVC. Don’t be surprised if that happens again with both of them.
“Freeman says a lot that we play these bigger schools in preparation for the state (playoffs),” Pino said. “Every time I hear him say that, I do agree. And I like it, to be honest.”
AT CEDAR RAPIDS XAVIER
DUBUQUE WAHLERT (53): Graham Ahlers 3-6 1-1 8, Brayden Tanny 1-6 5-6 7, Alex Tanny 4-8 4-5 12, Connor Walsh 2-12 0-0 5, Peter Wedewer 5-9 2-2 16, Reid Herrig 1-5 0-0 3, Owen Hlubek 1-1 0-0 2, Jimmy Topping 0-0 0-0 0, Nick Smith 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 17-48 12-14 53.
CEDAR RAPIDS XAVIER (57): Brady O’Donnell 3-4 0-0 7, A.J. Evans 3-12 4-6 10, Caleb Loffswold 0-3 0-0 0, Zander Murray 4-12 2-3 10, Lorenzo Pino 3-6 6-6 14, Andrew Allen 4-6 0-2 11, Carter Hoffmann 1-2 0-0 2, Sam Leuck 1-1 0-0 3, Mac Driscoll 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 19-46 12-17 57.
Halftime - Xavier 32, Wahlert 22. 3-point goals - Wahlert 7-26 (B. Tanny 0-4, A. Tanny 0-1, Walsh 1-6, Ahlers 1-3, Wedewer 4-7, Herrig 1-4, Smith 0-1), Xavier 6-16 (O’Donnell 1-2, Murray 0-3, Loffswold 0-2, Pino 2-3, Allen 3-5, Leuck 1-1). Rebounds - Wahlert 27 (A. Tanny 6), Xavier 35 (Murray, Evans 9). Total fouls - Wahlert 16, Xavier 17. Fouled out - None. Turnovers - Wahlert 8, Xavier 12.
Comments: (319)-398-8258, jeff.johnson@thegazette.com
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