By Ryan Atkinson
ratkinson@joplinglobe.com
COLUMBIA, Mo. — On the scoreboard, the Webb City Cardinals didn’t start taking control of their Class 4 third-place matchup with Lincoln Prep until the fourth quarter.
But even when the lead was changing hands seven times in the first half, the Cardinals looked like a team that was not going to end their season with a loss. Not with an impressive group of five seniors — four of whom start — and head coach Eric Johnson taking part in their final Webb City basketball game.
The Cardinals shrugged off a slow start and dominated the final 5:30 of the game, rolling to a 70-52 win at Mizzou Arena that gave them the state third-place trophy and sent Johnson riding into the sunset with a win.
“That’s how every game has gone, pretty much.,” Webb City senior Alan Pink said. “When it comes down to the fourth quarter, we know it’s crunch time. That’s the time we all get together and say ‘This is it. Let’s get going.’ It felt great for the whole team to end it like this.”
The Cardinals (26-5) — who were coming off a hard-to-swallow overtime loss to St. Charles West on Friday night — had trouble swatting away the Tigers early. Lincoln Prep (21-10) led by two late in the first half before the game went to halftime tied at 24.
But Webb City started pushing the ball more in the second half and began to wear down the Tigers. The Cardinals led by as many as six late in the third and then outscored the Tigers 25-9 in the final 6:52 to turn a 45-43 lead into an 18-point win.
“We always run,” senior Chance Sossamon said. “We’re good enough rebounders that one of us guards can go ahead and go and get easy transition baskets. They ran with us in the first quarter, but then maybe they got tired ... and we pulled it out.”
It was an 11-0 run — which saw six straight points from Webb City senior Landon Zerkel — that all but put the game out of reach.
Zerkel sandwiched a layup with two perfect trips to the foul line before Pink hit a bucket and one free throw and senior Caleb Powell added a layin to stretch a 48-45 lead into a 14-point cushion.
The key for the Cardinals in that stretch — and for much of the game — was rebounding. After being outrebounded by a smaller St. Charles West team on Friday, Webb City had five players with at least seven boards and had a 48-38 advantage on the glass.
“We stressed that because we knew they were going to put up a lot of shots and there were going to be a lot of long rebounds,” Johnson said. “(Friday) night we didn’t get all the long rebounds off the long shots and it made a little bit of difference in the game, but we made sure we got them today.”
Powell had an impressive second half, scoring 14 points and grabbing seven rebounds to push his game total to 18 and nine, respectively. Pink finished with 18 points and seven rebounds, scoring half of his points and getting seven of his boards in the final two quarters. Zerkel scored 14 and grabbed eight rebounds while going 8-of-10 from the foul line. Junior Trey Laveroni — Webb City’s only non-senior starter — had nine points and eight rebounds while Sossamon scored seven and added seven boards.
Lincoln Prep was led by Beaumont Beasley’s 15 points while Justin Henderson and Deron Lloyd added 13 and 10, respectively.
The Cardinals, admittedly, had a hard time not thinking about Friday’s loss during the first few minutes of Saturday’s contest. They scored seven of the first nine points, but let tie Tigers scored the final seven points of the first quarter.
“We all were disappointed with ourselves,” Pink said. “But we knew we had to come out with a win.”
“I would rather have won yesterday and won again today,” Sossamon said. “But on the same token, it feels good. It feels good getting this far and pulling out a win. ... We did our thing and pulled it out.”
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