Patient Moose fall short at Colony

PALMER — Time of possession is a crucial statistic on the football field, but basketball?

It was on Tuesday when Palmer head coach Paul Reid took a page from a football playbook

The Moose took minutes off the clock on three of their first four possesions and didn’t even attempt a shot until the halfway mark of the first quarter.

Why?

Reid and the Moose wanted to keep the ball out of the hands of the senior-laden lineup of the defending 4A state champion Colony Knights.

And while the strategy did work to an extent — the Knights were held to six points in the first, didn’t hit double digits in scoring until late in the first half and had just four players find the bottom of the bucket in the game — the Knights prevailed to earn the 32-22 win at Colony High School.

“It’s just really about being patient, trying to keep the ball out of their hands,” Reid said.

Longtime Colony head coach Don Witzel wasn’t completely surprised by Palmer’s approach, but it’s not what he expected when the Valley rivals took the court.

“I hadn’t really thought about it that much,” Witzel said. “(But) the last couple years, I’ve been waiting for somebody to do that to us, try to slow us down.”

Palmer’s strategy didn’t surprise the Colony players either.

“Not after thinking about it, because we tend to run the ball a lot,” Colony senior Alex Coon said.

Reid used National Football League quarterback Peyton Manning in his analogy.

“Opponents want to keep Peyton Manning on the sidelines,” Reid said. “We wanted to do something. Be patient on offense and look for really, really good shots, and not have to be on defense as much.”

On three of its first four possesions of the game, Palmer took a least a minute off the clock. On their third possesion, the Moose made eight passes — mostly around the perimeter — before junior Jaimi Cox drove the lane to make Palmer’s first attempt at the basket.

The Moose didn’t stray from the strategy and continued to try to chew time off the clock each time they had the ball.

“I’m proud of the way the girls came out and performed,” Reid said. “A couple of breaks here and there and it could have been a different outcomes.”

Colony used 16 points from Coon, a pair of pivotal three-pointers in the second half and a handful of free throws down the stretch to claim the win.

Colony’s three-pointers were arguably the biggest shots of the game. Junior Megan Bowker fired a three with 50 seconds left in the third to stretch Colony’s lead to five points. But early in the fourth quarter, Palmer’s Kelsey Campbell hit a three-pointer of her own to cut the score to 19-17. After senior Julianna Mangelsdorf tied the game with a pair of free throws, Bowker’s older sister Maria hit another three-pointer to break the 19-19 tie.

“Maria and Megan hit them when we needed them,” Coon said.

Contact Frontiersman sports editor Jeremiah Bartz at sports@frontiersman.com.

Colony 32, Palmer 22

Tuesday, Colony High School

Palmer 2-7-5-8—22

Colony

Palmer (22) — Cox 1 2-4 4, Campbell 1 0-0 3, Mangelsdorf 0 3-4 3, Bolling 1 0-0 2, Zimmer 2 2-4 6, Venzke 2 0-0 4; totals: 7 7-12 22.

Colony (32) — Hamann 0 2-2 2, Garrod 2 2-2 6, Ma. Bowker 1 0-0 3, Grazulis 0 2-2 2, Me. Bowker 1 00 3, Coon 7 2-3 16, Larson 0 0-1 0; Totals: 11 8-10 32.