On December 27th and 28th, both boys and girls Eagles basketball teams competed in the annual Elmwood-Plum City (EPC) varsity and junior varsity Holiday Tournament. In the boys’ bracket, the teams consisted of, the Cadott Hornets, the Ellsworth Panthers, the Alma-Pepin Eagles, and the EPC Wolves. The girls’ bracket contained the Augusta Beavers, the Prairie Farm Panthers, the Alma-Pepin Eagles, and the EPC Wolves.
All of the Alma-Pepin teams started the tournament by playing the EPC Wolves for the yearly “Battle of the Paddle.” The Eagles started strong with their teams winning the first games of the tournament. The boys played first, performing better than they had in their scrimmage against EPC at the beginning of the season. The Eagles finished the game on top, winning with a final score of 52-38. The Lady Eagles were the last game of the night and had a pretty simple first game. Along with their boys, the ladies defeated the Wolves, 52-22, securing both the girls' and boys’ paddles for the 2023-2024 season.
The next day both teams made it to the championship to meet up with a little tougher competition. The boys played Ellsworth a Division 3 team, while the girls played Praire Farm a Division 5 team.
The Lady Eagles were the first to play for the championship title. The first half of the competition was a back-and-forth battle. With 11 minutes left in the half, Prairie Farm started to gain an eight-point lead. The Eagles fought back but finished the half down by one point trailing, 21-20. Alma-Pepin controlled the second half, taking an early 8-point lead; they never looked back from there. The Eagles eventually carried on their lead by 12 points. Alma-Pepin completed the game by winning, 52-31.
The boys were up next. Both the Eagles and the Panthers had a leisurely start to the game. Almost five minutes had elapsed with only two points scored in total. The seesaw battle of points began soon after. With two minutes left in the half, the Panthers had the biggest lead of the game so far, six points ahead of the Eagles. Thus, the battle continued as the Eagles concluded the first half leading by one point, 24-23. Both Panthers and Eagles knew the contest wasn’t over. The alternating scores continued in the second half while neither team had a lead of over five points. It wasn’t until a minute left in the half that Ellsworth had a five-point lead against Alma-Pepin. With a three-pointer from senior Evan Olson, and two completed free throws from senior Jackson Riesgraf, the game was tied up with two seconds left on the clock. Neither team was able to score, sending the game into overtime. Similar to the regular game, the points went back and forth between the two teams. Even with a minute left in the overtime, Alma-Pepin was only leading by one point, 55-54. Because of the time crunch, the Panthers knew they had to foul. Already in foul trouble, two of the Panther’s starters had fouled out. Both Alma-Pepin and Ellsworth were in double bonus; the Eagles had no problem making their free throws, whereas the Panthers struggled. With the help of the made free throws, the Eagles defeated Ellsworth, 62-55. Alma-Pepin’s head coach Chris Creighton's famous words consist of, “Free throws win games.”
With both girls' and boys’ teams winning their games, Alma-Pepin won the whole tournament. Not only were the varsity teams successful, but also both JV teams. The Eagles went 8-0 total, over the whole weekend. This is the second year in a row that the boys’ team has won the entire tournament. Last year the girls fell just short as they lost to Merrill in the championship. The Eagles continue their play, with both teams playing Melrose-Mindoro the week of January 1st.
Article Written by: Tori Creighton
Photos by: Heidi Stewart