By Rob Burns

For The Daily World

ELMA — Returning from the weekend’s Seaside Tournament in Oregon, Elma’s two varsity basketball teams stepped onto their home court on Tuesday with mixed results.

The Eagles girls took on an undefeated King’s Way Christian squad and relied upon their defense to shut down the Knights, 51-35.

For the boys, Elma couldn’t find its shooting touch as KWC used its defense to run away with a 61-29 win.

After the Christmas holiday, Elma’s boys return to action at home against Ilwaco on Wednesday, Dec. 27. The Elma girls will host Tumwater on Thursday, Dec. 28.

GIRLS

Eagles 51, Knights 35

Throughout the entire first half, both Elma (10-0) and KWC (5-1) turned up their defensive intensity to make life difficult for the opposition.

Elma’s full-court pressure defense caused 18 turnovers in the first half from the Knights. KWC’s trapping zone defense, in return, kept the Eagles from taking advantage of those turnovers.

Both teams ran into the halftime locker rooms with Elma leading, 23-19.

“We came out, changed our full-court defense to a full-court man (defense) and kept the intensity,” Elma head coach Lisa Johnson said. “We went back to our M.O. — our defense. We still battled through. This was a very good team win. We just came off a tournament title in Seaside and our energy was four solid quarters of basketball. They never let down. I’m very proud of them.”

King’s Way opened the second half with a scrambling 3-point basket to close to within one, 23-22. Elma made sure that was as close as the Knights got.

Using the turnovers from the Knights, plus patiently getting the ball into the paint, the Eagles outscored the Knights, 13-3, for the remainder of the quarter.

And, while the defense kept KWC from mounting another attack, Elma got a balanced dose of offense — Jalyn Sackrider, Kali Rambo, Quin Mikel, Jillian Bieker and Molly Johnston all had a hand on offense in the third quarter.

“You aren’t going to have just one person stand out on this team,” Johnson added. “Every night, you will have a different leading scorer, have someone doing something different every night. If someone gets into foul trouble, the others will pick it up from there.”

Leading 36-25, the Eagles never led by less than 10 points for the final quarter of the contest. The Knights finished with 30 turnovers overall.

Mikel led all scorers with 11 points, with Rambo and Sackrider each adding 10 points each.

Boys

Knights 61, Eagles 29

Elma’s goal in every game, according to head coach Jeff Niemi, is to win the first quarter. On Tuesday, the visitors were the ones to claim that goal and they never relinquished the lead.

“One of my goals is to win the first quarter; it hasn’t happened often, but tonight, it was the worst of all situations,” Niemi said. “When your best player has two fouls and you aren’t making your shots, that’s a tough situation for a young team to be in. That’s exactly what happened.”

The Knights (2-5) took control of the paint, grabbed the most rebounds and never allowed the Eagles (1-9) to get on track offensively consistently.

Elma used a quick spurt to cut a 16-5 deficit to 16-10 with 1:39 left in the frame. A steal and basket from Carter Jacobson, as well as inside scores from Ray Billerback got Elma to this point.

KWC called timeout, regathered its breath and scored the final five points of the quarter for a 21-10 lead.

From there, KWC used second- and third-chance shots from offensive rebounds and forced turnovers out of Elma’s hands to extend the lead.

“We talked about when someone wants to play that much pressure, if you have the dribble, you have to attack them,” Niemi said. “There were a lot of missed opportunities in the first quarter and in the first half that would have kept us close and in the game. We tracked eight missed layups and we told them at halftime that if they hit those, we were in the game. We had the shots, but they didn’t go for us.”

Jacobson led Elma with six points and Cody Vollan had six rebounds.

Boys

KWC 21 15 12 13 — 61

Elma 10 7 6 6 — 29

KWC (61) — Kh. Cason 21, Koenders 4, Kef. Cason 10, Packer, Dodge 2, Frahm 6, Metz 11, Snider 7. FG — 23-58 (.397). FT — 9-11.

Elma (29) — Aho, Jacobson 6, Johnston 5, Billerback 3, Vollan 5, Schneider 4, Acuff, Swint 2, Richey 4. FG —11-39 (.282) FT — 6-11.

GIRLS

Eagles 51, Knights 35

KWC 7 12 6 10 — 35

Elma 12 11 13 15 — 51

KWC (35) — Hutchin 3, Zook 8, Moats 6, Kolb 2, Cummins 9, Schroeder 3, L. Zook 4. FG— 13-42. (.310).FT — 2-5.

Elma (51) –– Sackrider 10, Bieker 4, Burgher 5, Olson, Bol 3, Johnson, Mikel 11, Johnston 8, Rambo 10. FG — 20-47 (.426). FT — 8-17.