High school basketball season is quickly approaching the end of the regular season with about three weeks to play.

Teams are now looking to move into the postseason.
The Columbia boys basketball team is heading in the right direction down the stretch. The team currently sits at 16-6 and posted a huge conference win at home on Thursday.

“We played three games last week and we won the two most important ones,” Columbia coach Mark Sandstrom said. “We beat Civic Memorial on Tuesday and that was really important for seeding. Of course on Thursday, it was an important game for us because it got us back in the conference race. We wanted to win the league and in order to do that, we had to win on Thursday.”

The Eagles bested CM, 49-44, last Tuesday. Two days later, they got an important win over Cahokia Conference leader Breese Central, 53-49. Sandstrom said the team’s goal was to win the conference this year. Right now, Central sits at 8-1 in the league while Columbia is one spot lower at 6-1.

“They were 22-2 going into that game and ranked No. 2 in Class 2A in the state,” Sandstrom said. “It was really a quality win. Central defends their home court and we’ve had to defend ours. That’s the way things have played out. But, overall, in the Breese Central game, we won the stat list. Our inside presence was Korbin Farmer and Drew Huebner. I thought those two guys played really well over the course of the game. They were able to finish inside when they got the ball.”

Farmer finished with 13 points and nine rebounds. Huebner had 11 points and three rebounds, with both logging heavy minutes on the court.

But it was the play of Jordan Holmes that separated the teams. He scored 18 points to lead Columbia.

“Jordan Holmes just played spectacular. He did a lot of different things off the ball screen,” Sandstrom said. “He hit three big three-point field goals and I also have to credit Jordan’s defense on Breese Central’s best player, Logan Kohrmann. In the last four minutes of the game we switched him onto Kohrmann and he didn’t score in the last few minutes of the game.”

Those three may have helped the team get a big win on Thursday, but all five starters can create mismatches for opponents.

“We just have good balance,” Sandstrom said. “We basically have five guys that are averaging or right at double figures. So, it’s really hard for another team to not play us straight up because we definitely have mismatches every night and we try to take advantage of those. Just overall, our kids share the ball.”

The team is led by Jonathan Holmes, Jordan’s older brother, with 14.1 points per game. Farmer follows with 11.6 points per game. Jordan scores 10.1, Huebner averages 9.9 and Ryan Gudeman scores 8.7 points per game, respectively.

In the Bank of O’Fallon Shootout on Saturday, Columbia lost to a tough DeKalb team, 62-37. Jonathan Holmes scored 13 to lead the Eagles.

Columbia hosts Carlyle at 7:45 p.m. on Friday. It is the first of three straight league games before the team ends the regular season at home against Triad on Feb. 26.

Gibault is also looking ahead to the playoffs and a shot at 20 wins on the year. Sitting at 17-8, the

Hawks are on a current two-game winning streak.

“We feel like that would be something to get challenged for this year, to get to 20 (wins) before the playoffs,” Gibault coach Dennis Rueter said. “We’ve got four games left.”

Gibault beat Triad, 49-47, last Tuesday. The Hawks then beat Chester, 57-36, at home on Thursday.

The Hawks are getting help from everyone. Freshman Karson Huels helped open up the win over Triad.

“Karson really shoots it well, he’s had opportunities the last two games where he’s had more opportunities to shoot the ball. He’s been able to make it,” Rueter said. “He opened up the Triad game in the second quarter, it was pretty tight. He made two three-pointers in a row and that gave us some separation that we kept for the rest of the game.”

Of course, Gibault is still getting much of its scoring done through Trevor Davis, Brian Deterding and Jacob Rueter. Davis is averaging 15.9 points per game, Deterding is at 15 and Rueter is at 11.2 points per game.

Colin Kessler and Garrett Rueter are contributing valuable minutes in addition to Huels.

“We are getting contributions from some people, some of the older guys,” coach Rueter said. “We’re still a little top heavy, but we’ve gotten more significant contributions in certain games.”

The Hawks played Waterloo in a cross-town showdown on Tuesday night. The result was not known at press time.

“We’ve been playing pretty well lately. We’ve felt pretty good about the way we’ve played,” Rueter said.

Waterloo has been stuck on six wins this season. The team is currently 6-17 overall and on a seven-game losing streak heading into Tuesday’s game at Gibault. The Bulldogs fell to Granite City, 81-37, last Tuesday and then to Triad, 56-45, on Friday.

The team has had a few bright spots; two juniors are leading the team in scoring. Ben Huels is averaging 15.2 points per game; Griffin Lenhardt is up to 10.4 points per game. Ross Schrader, just a sophomore, has scored in bunches of late and is averaging nearly 10 points per game.

Waterloo continues its season at Highland on Friday.

Valmeyer is coming off its first winning streak of the season. The Pirates beat New Athens, 73-59, last Tuesday, and turned around to beat Marissa, 59-52, at home on Friday.

Trent Larsen scored 23 points against New Athens, while Michael Chism followed with 18 points. In the next game, Larsen led the way again with 18 points and Chism followed with 14 points. Vaughn Larsen scored 13 points and Owen Miller had 12.

Chism is leading the team in scoring on the year at 14 points per game.

On Saturday, the Pirates lost at Chester, 69-48. Chism led the way again with 17 points.

The Pirates play at Dupo on Friday night.

Dupo lost to Steeleville, 53-29, on Thursday, dropping the Tigers to 4-16 on the season.

Austin Francis leads the team at 13.5 points per game, with Michael Overbay and Tony Cozart contributing nearly 10 points per game each.

Regional basketball schedules are expected to be posted this Friday afternoon online at www.ihsa.org.