Stars shine in road playoff win

Prologue
Its opening night of the playoffs in the metro.  I'm off to the 4 vs 5 game in section 6AAA with Washburn hosting Holy Angels.  The hot dog not prewrapped tonight, assembly required at the concession stand.  12 ounces of Sprite to go with it.  We get the Washburn pep band but not for the pregame.  Only for the anthem and during the game.  Interesting way to do it.

Song of the Day
We Built This City - Starship

Total Beverage Consumption Counter: 1348 ounces  (113 games, 97 days)

• 12 oz 7 Up 
• 20 oz Barq's Root Beer
• 20 oz Mug Root Beer 
• 80 oz Sprite 
• 84 oz Dr Pepper
• 160 oz Red Powerade
• 232 oz Red Gatorade
• 184 oz Coke 
• 520 oz Pepsi

Game Time
Jeff Jones drives for a pair of free throws and its 5-4 Holy Angels 3 mines in.  Then Holy Angels opens up the lead with a 14-2 run.  Connor Failor off the bench with a pair of hoops during that run.  Taylor BonGiovanni with a pair of buckets during the run as well as he got off to a hot start.  A loose ball ends up in the hands of Joey Poehling for 2 to end the run.  19-6 Stars at the 9:35 mark.  Kevin Gleason banks in a 3 on a post kickout to break the run with BonGiovanni getting a rest.  Charlie Koontz was ice cold early but found his offense in the latter part of the 2nd half.  He scores all 9 of his 1st half points the rest of the half.  Holy Angels 30-20 at the break.

Wallace Hicks with a huge swat of Jeff Jones to start the half, but its Washburn with the momentum.  Evan Shepherd with a 3.  Then a 3 point play to start a 7-0 run.  34-30 AHA with 13:54 left and AHA takes their 2nd timeout of the half to try and keep this one from flipping quickly.  Washburn misses 3 chances to cut into the lead.  Shepherd with another bomb to counter a Koontz bucket and the Millers are within 3.  They can't convert another pair of chances to get even closer.  Koontz driving for 2 and a pair of post free throws to push the lead back to 7.  Shepherd deep and playable again, then Jones coast to coast and he finishes with the scoop.  40-38 Holy Angels hanging on as they take another timeout with 6:54 left.

Its Koontz back to the charity stripe via post up and via and offensive board.  He makes 3 straight free throws from that.  Then Holy Angels outworks Washburn for a loose rebound and that becomes a bucket that pushes the lead to 46-38 with 4:23 left.  Then 2 missed Washburn free throws.  But this one still isn't over as Shepherd sets a nice back screen and pops on the inbounds for a corner 3.  Jones misses a good look with 1:30 left.  Holy Angels makes 8 of 10 free throws from there.  Holy Angels moves on with the 54-45 road win.

Post Game
Evan Shepherd with 15 of his 18 points in the 2nd half to lead Washburn.  He had 4 3s in the 2nd half.  Jeff Jones with a quiet 10 points but no other help for the Millers.  Washburn did get some good looks against the length of the Holy Angels 2-3 zone.  With 2 disappointing years of underachieving with a talented roster and Reggie Perkins back at Washburn as the AD (won the 2009 state title as Washburn head coach), you have to wonder if the writing is on the wall for Perkins to reclaim his old job.  The Millers finish the season 16-10.

Charlie Koontz leads Holy Angels with 22 points.  Taylor BonGiovanni was hot early and finished with 13 points.  Coach Jesse Foley masterful job managing momentum with his timeouts.  Nice strategy to use the length with the 2-3 zone.  Though they aren't very agressive with it like say a Columbia Heights is.  Wallace Hicks only 2 points but gave the Stars great minutes.  He played much bigger than his size getting on the defensive board and opened eyes with the huge swat of Jeff Jones early in the 2nd half.  Holy Angels advances to Saturday night's 6AAA semifinal in Chanhassen against #1 seed Holy Family.  Holy Family beat the Stars 63-38 in mid-December.