Rolla boys hold off Helias

After very nearly getting blitzed out of the gym by a torrid Rolla 3-point attack in the first quarter, the Helias Crusaders righted the ship and slowly started to cut into the lead.

And when Sam Husting drilled a 3 with 3:26 left in the third quarter to give Helias its first lead at 42-41, things looked pretty rosy for the Crusaders.

The lead lasted all of 16 seconds.

The Bulldogs pushed the ball upcourt and Josh Pritchett converted a layup to give Rolla the lead back for good, as the state's sixth-ranked team in Class 4 went on to claim a 65-63 win at Rackers Fieldhouse.

Rolla coach Mark Miller said that big play started where things always do for the Bulldogs, with superb point guard Kobe Wands.

"(That play) was big, but that's a part of our team," he said. "We run a drill called "get-n-go' in practice, and Koby Wands is one of the premier guards in getting it done right. Our bigs are supposed to get the ball out of the hole in a hurry, get it into his hands and we go up the floor and try to make it a situation where they don't get to enjoy that bucket they just made."

The fact Helias was able to be in the game at that point reflected a great effort after the way things started.

Rolla came out red-hot, hitting eight of its first 11 shots - including a scorching 4-of-5 on 3s - to take a 20-10 lead after a little more than six minutes.

"We didn't have enough ball pressure on them early in the game," Helias coach Josh Buffington said. "Once we got to the ball and our closeouts were done how we prepared, then we did a better job on them."

Amazingly, the Bulldogs would miss 17 straight 3s after that - making just 2-of-22 total after the hot start - to allow the Crusaders to start walking down the lead.

"We shot poorly for us," Miller said. "We normally put the ball in the hole and we did hit some shots early that got us out to a lead and gave us a good feel for the court. Then it just seemed like we went ice cold."

Rolla ended the first quarter up 20-13, but Helias would win every quarter after that, taking the second and fourth quarters by two points each and the third quarter by a single point.

A seven-point second quarter by Weston Porter helped Helias get within 30-25 at halftime and a seven-point period by Trevor Koelling in the third cut the Rolla lead to 47-43.

"You can't come out against that team and start out on your heels," Buffington said. "You have to play 32 minutes of smart basketball, very aggressive basketball on both ends, to beat them. If we want to be successful in districts, should we play them again, that's what we're going to have to do."

Rolla built the lead all the way back up to 59-47 in the fourth quarter before Helias made one last charge. Layups by Koelling and Landon Harrison, plus a 3 by Husting, resulted in a 7-0 spurt to get the Crusaders withing 59-54 with 2:18 left.

The lead stayed around that big and Rolla was up 65-58 before one last-gasp effort. Adam Bax made a layup with :14.0 left and after Rolla missed the front end of a one-and-one, Harrison canned a 3 with :05 left. But after calling a timeout, Rolla was able to run out the clock.

"I thought our guys did a great job getting back in the game, obviously we're proud of that," Buffington said. "They didn't have any quit in them down the stretch. There's definitely some things we can fix if we're lucky enough to see them again."

Wands racked up a game-high 21 points, while Sam Marshall added 16 for the Bulldogs and Zach Brown had 10.

"It was a great environment to play basketball in. We had a good time," Miller said. "... I'm just so thankful that we could get a win here tonight against such a good team like Helias."

Koelling had a double-double to lead Helias, racking up a team-high 17 points and a game-high 13 rebounds. Porter ended up with 15 points and was second-best among all players with seven rebounds.

Rolla improved to 14-1, while Helias dropped to 9-5.

"You can't win games if you're not playing inside-out - we didn't get the ball in the paint enough," Buffington said. "We had a size advantage at almost every spot and we shot 28 3s. That was not the gameplan."

Helias returns to action Tuesday at Jefferson City.

In Friday's JV game, Rolla posted a 50-44 win.

Nick Brandt had 15 points for Helias (5-3) and Alex Buschjost added 10.