Darlington boys double up Iowa-Grant

By John Dalton

The Darlington boys’ basketball bounced back from their lone loss of the year to Mineral Point and in convincing style dominated visiting Iowa-Grant 87-47 last Thursday night.

The Redbirds' pressure defense caused many Panther turnovers, which led to many points off those turnovers in this contest.  10 Redbirds would score in this one, who led start-to-finish, with Sophomore Broker Buschor leading all scorers with 23.  Teammate Will Murray followed with 19 points.  

“We thought coming in that we would have a puncher chance because they would be reeling a little coming off that Mineral Point loss, but boy were we wrong on that,” said Iowa-Grant Head Coach Shawn Dailey following the game.  “They defended like we have never been defended all year.  We couldn’t get it past half-court with their man-to-man press and they just beat the heck out of us physically.”  

 Darlington’s quickness and physicality were the difference in this game and one reason they are ranked 4th in the state in Division 4.  

“That is one well-coached team (Darlington) and a really good starting five, and so strong and physical.  We were outmatched and I can’t get too down on the game,” Coach Dailey would go on to say.  

Iowa-Grant was led in scoring by Senior Cyle Steffl with 17 points followed by Sophomore Everett Zimmer with 14.  

After a holiday tournament game, the Panthers will return back to conference play on Friday, January 5th as they host Cuba City.  Tip-off is set for 7:30 p.m.  

BOX SCORE

Darlington 47 – 40 – 87

Iowa-Grant 22 – 25 - 47

Darlington (fg-ft-tp); Buschor 10-1-23, Will Murray 8-3-19, Zuberbuhler 4-2-13, Jackson 3-2-8, Carter Murray 2-3-7, Glendenning 3-0-6, Carpenter 1-0-3, Cagyn Paisley 1-0-3, Payton Paisley 1-0-3, Gille 1-0-2.

3-pointers; Zuberbuhler 3, Buschor 2, Carpenter 1, P. Paisley 1, C. Paisley 1. 

Iowa-Grant (fg-ft-tp); Steffl 4-8-17, Zimmer 6-1-14, Schmitz 2-2-6, Lundell 2-0-5, Loeffelholz 1-3-5, Fisher 1-0-2.

3-pointers; Lundell 1, Zimmer 1, Steffl 1.