Ryan Murken

Your Prep Sports

WEST BRANCH – Playing two games in 24 hours after losing your leading scorer to injury and coming off the lowest scoring output in more than a month is hardly a recipe for an offensive explosion.

Don’t bother attempting to explain that to Class 2A eighth-ranked West Branch.

A night after seeing its 11-game winning streak end with a 60-41 loss at Monticello and playing without leading scorer Jeff Bowie the Bears put up a season-high in points and rolled to an 83-66 win over Tipton on Tuesday in a River Valley Conference South Division tilt in West Branch.

“Last night was an embarrassment and we wanted to come back tonight and start things up again,” West Branch senior point guard Whaley said. “We wanted to get that momentum back again just like we had.”

It was an impressive offensive performance that helped the Bears get back on track on Tuesday.

Six different players scored in double figures as West Branch shot 60 percent from the field and went 21-of-25 from the free throw line while improving to 13-2 on the season and 12-2 in RVC play.

“The first thing I said in the locker room last night is the best thing about losing tonight is we have a game tomorrow,” West Branch coach Jason Kern said. “Our kids were definitely ready to go tonight.”

West Branch was without Bowie for the third straight game after the 6-foot-5 junior center had his season end shoulder injury.

Bowie was leading West Branch with 13.8 points and 6.1 rebounds per game.

The Bears didn’t skip a beat without their big man on Tuesday.

Whaley led six Bears in double figures with a game-high 21 points while Lukavsky had a double-double with 10 points and 13 rebounds.

“He’s a big loss, that’s a big body that we could have used but it’s tough seeing someone go down to an injury like that,” Lukavsky said. “We know we have to pick it up on the rebounding end because he pulled down a lot of big boards.”

West Branch led 16-13 after one quarter and then put the game out of reach by kicking its offense into overdrive in the final eight minutes of the first half.

The Bears used a 33-point second quarter to build a 17-point halftime lead that Tipton (5-11, 4-10) could never trim under seven.

Whaley had 10 of his 21 in the second quarter, cashing in on 8-of-10 trips to the free throw line, while consistently attacking the lane off the dribble.

“Last night we were tentative, we played scared so tonight we wanted to take it to them,” Whaley said. “If you take it to them on offense it opens up everything.”

With the scoring production of Bowie gone the rest of the West Branch starters were asked to shoulder more of the scoring load.

Everyone did that and then some on Tuesday.

Senior Trey Eagle entered a 6.9 point per game scorer and finished with 14 points and seven boards.

Juniors Simon Palmer and  Gavin Hierseman each bested their season scoring averages finishing with 11.

“Jeff was averaging 13 or 14 points per game so that’s huge I know me being a senior I like to take the lead on this team and we have to make up those points somehow,” Whaley said. “I’m trying to do what I can, if it’s driving or opening up things for other guys.”

West Branch also got a big boost from its bench in the form of sophomores Peyton Miller and Brady Knoop.

Miller had 10 points on 5-of-5 shooting and Knoop knocked down a pair of 3-pointers including a one that was part of a 10-2 run to open the second quarter.

“Losing 14 points and eight rebounds we had to have other guys stepping up,” Kern said. “We have that next man in mentality and we see these guys in practice all the time and we know what they are capable of and we told them their number is going to get called and you have to step up and they really rose to the occasion tonight.”

Tipton got as close as seven on two occasions in the fourth quarter but West Branch closed the game on a 15-5 run.

The Bears made all seven fourth-quarter field goal attempts while securing the win.

“It was huge, we were all down after last night,” Whaley said. “We wanted to come back tonight and show everyone that’s not who we are and get back to our old ways.”

Frank Bierman had 19 points and 10 rebounds to lead Tipton while Trent Pelzer added 17 points for the Tigers.

West Branch             16  33  15  19  –  83

Tipton                        13  19  18  16  –  66

West Branch (83) – Peyton Miller 5-5 0-0 10, Brady Knoop 2-3 0-0 6, Matt Whaley 5-9 10-13 21, Trey Eagle 4-6 5-5 14, Gavin Hierseman 4-8 1-2 11, Tanner Lukavsky 3-8 4-4 10, Simon Palmer 5-8 1-1 11, Team 28-47 21-25 83.

Tipton (66) – Trent Pelzer 5-14 5-6 17, Colby Kleppe 3-8 2-2 9, Frank Bierman 6-11 7-9 19, Cole Syring 1-3 0-0 3, Bob Ryan 0-2 0-0 0, Payten Elijah 2-6 2-2 7, Landan Hill 3-10 1-2 7, Kayden Rezac 2-5 0-0 4, Team 22-59 17-21 66.

3-point field goals – WB 6-13 (Knoop 2-3, Whaley 1-2, Eagle 1-3, Hierseman 2-3, Lukavsky 0-1, Palmer 0-1), TIP 5-19 (Pelzer 2-7, Kleppe 1-3, Syring 1-2, Ryan 0-1, Elijah 1-2, Hill 0-2, Rezac 0-2). Rebounds – WB 32 (Lukavsky 13), TIP 27 (Bierman 10). Turnovers – WB 12, TIP 10. Total fouls – WB 17, TIP 22. Fouled out – WB (Palmer). Technical fouls – None.

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