ONALASKA — A big game by Kayla Ketelhut and two timely 3-pointers by Olivia Passehl helped the Onalaska High School girls basketball team pick up a 55-40 MVC victory over Holmen on Friday.
The Hilltoppers (9-3, 2-0) won their fourth game in a row and were led by Ketelhut, a sophomore who scored 26 points. She scored 16 of those in the first half and made 10 free throws in the second to help Onalaska put away the Vikings (7-4, 1-3).
Holmen had drawn to within 34-30 when sophomore Layni Wood turned an offensive rebound into a basket with 14 minutes, 59 seconds left in the game. The score stayed that way until two consecutive Onalaska possessions ended in Passehl 3-pointers.
“We did a nice job in transition of pushing the ball up the floor,” Onalaska coach Tom Cowley said. “There was kind of a 2-on-1 situation, and they had to stop the ball.
“We found the open girl and she hit the shot.”
Passehl, a junior, hit her second 3 just 28 seconds later, and the Hilltoppers suddenly had a 40-30 lead with 12:06 left. Holmen never got closer than eight points the rest of the game.
Passehl and junior Finley Walters both added nine points for Onalaska, which opened up an 11-point halftime lead by taking advantage of Holmen’s cold shooting. The Vikings made their final field goal of the first half when Charley Casey converted a drive with 7:39 on the clock.
Senior Macy Kline scored a team-high 12 points for Holmen, which also received 11 from Wood and nine from Casey.
“They are learning a new system offensively and defensively, and when we played them over the summer, we got destroyed,” Cowley said of the Vikings, who entered the night with a four-game winning streak. “That was on the minds of some of our girls, but we came out and executed our gameplan.”
Aquinas 79, Logan 10
LA CROSSE — The first-place Blugolds (12-1, 5-0 MVC) won their 12th game in a row and held the Rangers (2-8, 0-3) to five points in each half at the Steve Hole Field House.
Ten players scored for Aquinas, and five of them finished in double figures. Senior Alaina Elias led the way with 18 points and made 8 of 12 shots to help the Blugolds win their 119th straight conference game.
Aquinas also received 10 points apiece from senior Sammy Davis, sophomore Hadley Alderson, junior Ava Fernholz and junior Liv Dickinson. Davis made 6 of 8 shots and had five assists and four steals, while Dickinson had a team-high seven of the Blugolds’ 32 steals.
Fernholz tied Davis for the team lead with five assists, and senior Maddie Grossbach pulled down a team-high nine rebounds.
Logan was led by senior Kaia DePaolo’s four points.
Alma Center Lincoln 63, Melrose-Mindoro 56
ALMA CENTER — The Mustangs (5-5, 3-5 Dairyland-Large) had a three-game winning streak snapped while getting outscored in each half.
Alma Center Lincoln led 33-28 after one half and extended the lead by a bucket in the second half.
Melrose-Mindoro senior Anna Radcliffe kept her team in the game by scoring 35 points. She made three 3-pointers and had 17 of those points in the first half and made four more 3s and scored 18 points in the second.
Radcliffe is averaging 21.4 points per game after the big performance.
Senior teammate Cooper Zeman made two second-half 3-pointers and added 10 points for the Mustangs.
