Cedar Rapids Prairie boys basketball team on a run at the right time of the season

CEDAR RAPIDS - They’re not being shy about it.

The Cedar Rapids Prairie Hawks openly said Friday night that they need a weekend sweep of their games. It’s an imperative.

Well, first half of that sweep attained.

Will Wehr scored 20 points, Prairie built a 13-point lead in the fourth quarter and hung on for a 65-59 boys basketball win over Linn-Mar at the Hawks gym. It reversed the outcome of the Mississippi Valley Conference rivals’ first game between each other early this season.

Prairie (12-4) has won nine of its last 10 games with a shot at making it 10 of 11 late Saturday afternoon. That’s when the Hawks play eighth-ranked Des Moines Roosevelt in a Crossover Challenge event game at Waukee.

“One of our big goals was to host in the playoffs,” Prairie Coach Todd Kuntz said. “And we feel like we're really on that trajectory. But, I mean, we know we have to win tomorrow. We know we’ve got to get Roosevelt.”

There is another week of games for Class 3A and 4A teams to pad their resumes in order to secure being in the top eight of the Iowa High School Athletic Association’s rankings in those classes. The top eight teams get No. 1 seeds in their respective substates.

Prairie wasn’t in 4A’s top 10 this week, but beating Linn-Mar and Roosevelt will at least get it into the discussion this coming week. The bottom half of the 4A rankings have been highly fluid all winter.

“I thought we played good tonight,” said Wehr. “It was just a fun environment. Good to get them (Linn-Mar) back.”

“I told our guys that if we go and we take care of business, things are going to work out,” Kuntz said. “You know, we’ve just got to do what we’ve got to do. So it's important.”

Prairie has been known as a team that can shoot the lights out from 3-point range, but in recent games that hasn’t been the case. Yet it still has found a way to win.

The Hawks were 3 of 17 from deep Friday night but made up for that by getting to the free-throw line a lot and making those free throws. Specifically that was 16 of 20.

This game was tied midway through the third quarter at 35, with Prairie going on a run that eventually gave it a 13-point lead of 55-42 early in the fourth. Points in that span were short jumpers, lane drives, free throws and transition run-outs.

“It was definitely getting in transition. I think that's the biggest thing,” Wehr said. “Like just getting in transition, getting those early 3s up so we can crash the glass or get two feet in the paint. So, I mean, yeah, once we just hit our rhythm, we just kept going.”

Linn-Mar (10-6) rallied behind some defensive stops and buckets from Tyler Hilton, Karson Rains and Max Robertson. A 9-0 run made it a 57-55 Prairie lead with 2:25, then after a Prairie basket, Rains countered with a trey that brought the Lions within 59-58.

But Linn-Mar got no closer. Superb senior forward Hilton had a team-high 15 points, with Robertson adding 14 and Rains and forward Blake Ritze 10 each.

Regularly in the rankings over the past month, Linn-Mar has fallen out of them and has dropped three games in a row.

AT CEDAR RAPIDS PRAIRIE

LINN-MAR (59): Blake Ritze 5-6 0-2 10, Tyler Hilton 4-11 6-6 15, Max Robertson 5-7 1-4 14, Garrett Bauermeister 1-5 0-0 3, Karson Rains 4-13 0-0 10, Dexter Bruscheen 3-6 0-0 7, Nolan Runge 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 22-48 7-12 59.

CEDAR RAPIDS PRAIRIE (65): David Fason 4-13 0-1 8, Collin McClintock 1-3 2-2 4, Caleb Eckert 1-2 0-0 2, Ayden Meier 2-5 0-0 4, Will Wehr 7-14 5-5 20, Austin Joens 3-8 0-0 7, Tae Alexander 2-7 7-10 11, Cayden Larson 2-5 2-2 7, Eli Borschel 1-2 0-0 2, Jayden Stumpff 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 23-59 16-20 65.

Halftime - Linn-Mar 30, Prairie 29. 3-point goals - Linn-Mar 8-25 (Hilton 1-3, Robertson 3-4, Bauermeister 1-4, Rains 2-9, Brunscheen 1-4, Runge 0-1), Prairie 3-17 (Fason 0-3, Meier 0-3, Wehr 1-4, Joens 1-4, Alexander 0-1, Larson 1-1, Borschel 0-1). Rebounds - Linn-Mar 29 (Hilton 12), Prairie 37 (Alexander 7). Total fouls - Linn-Mar 22, Prairie 18. Fouled out - Hilton, McClintock. Turnovers - Linn-Mar 7, Prairie 5.

Comments: (319)-398-8258, jeff.johnson@thegazette.com