Thursday, January 11, 2024
Sports Stall At Week’s End
The first week in January 2024 came to a rough ending on Friday, January 5. Both the Gowanda Varsity boys basketball team and the Gowanda Varsity girls basketball team had problematic road games.
The Gowanda boys were at Springville for a non-league match-up. Springville got off to a quick start much like Gowanda hads often done to other teams. Springville ran up the first six points in the game before Trelin Warrior scored Gowanda’s first two points. Gowanda later closed the gap to 8-5 with a Quentin Centner 3-pointer, but it was all downhill from there. Gowanda was down 24-10 after one quarter. A slightly better 2nd Quarter saw that gap narrowed to 37-26 at halftime. Gowanda was unable to recover from that deficient and took a 71-56 loss. Quentin Centner accumulated four 3-pointers in the game towards a total of 24 points. Trelin Warrior contributed 15 points including a 3-pointer. Seth Geiger landed two shots from 3-point range for six points. Also scoring for Gowanda were Troy Jimerson (9 points) and Blake Herman (2 points).
Friday the 5th also gave the girls team problems as they were at the Pioneer Tournament. Their first game was against the host team. It was a major mismatch with the very tall and athletic Pioneer girls in control of the game from the start. Pioneer scored the first four points in the game. A Corrina John 3-pointer narrowed the score to 4-3. Points were hard to come by for Gowanda leaving them down 15-7 after a quarter and 30-13 at halftime. Springville rolled over Gowanda 22-0 in the 3rd Quarter ballooning their lead to 52-13 at that point A relatively slow final period gave Pioneer a 59-15 win. Gowanda’s only two points in the 2nd half came from Marissa Beaver with 50 seconds left in the game. Corrina John had a pair of 1st half 3-pointers for 6 points before going silent in the 2nd half. Karice John also had a 3-pointer in the first half. With two points each in the game were Lauren Kelly, Christina Wilder and Marissa Beaver.
The Gowanda girls were back at the Pioneer Tournament on the 6th facing Holland in the Consolation Game. This turned out to be a more even match-up, but still another loss. Outscored 9-1 in the 1st Quarter, Gowanda was in a hole they wouldn’t note climb out of. It was 16-6 at halftime on the way to a 38-24 final. Karice John led Gowanda with 6 points including a 3-pointer. Lauren Kelly had four points. Corina John, Marissa Beaver and Layla Gamble each contributed a 3-pointer to the Gowanda scoring. Also scoring for Gowanda were Lily Scanlan (2 points), Autumn Pupo (2 points) and Christina wilder (1 point).
Only the Gowanda bowling teams had winning efforts on Friday the 5th. They hosted West Valley at Gowanda’s K&L Lanes. Both the boys and girls teams came away with 4-0 wins. For the boys, it was with games of 821-702, 855-783 and 975-680 for a match total of 2651-2165. Gowanda’s top bowler was Nicholas Smuda (170-172-185/527). Also bowling for the Gowanda boys were Gavin Whitcher (149-131-163/443), Morgan Ruff (144-151-145/440), Kory Degenfelder (108-155-166/429), Drezden Spire (139-118-165/422) and Zachary Hojnacki (111-128-151/390).
The Gowanda girls got their win with games of 681-517, 729-514 and 747-535 for a match total of 2157-1566. Bowling full sets for the Gowanda girls were Bailey Shields (132-149-145/426), Aubrie Smuda (120-145-142/407), Sierra Twoguns (130-143-113/368) and Makayla Kuras (110-127-137/374). Bowling a pair of games were Natalia Elliott (87 & 112) and Emma Golden (82 and 98). Rolling single games during the match were Lila Offenbach (107) and Tayleigh Williams (78).
In other week ending sports. Gowanda Wrestlers were also busy. The team was at the 7th Annual NYSPHSAA Section VI Dual Meet Wrestling Championships on January 6 at Niagara County Community College. Chautauqua Lake was the overall winner with Gowanda coming in 4th ahead of 5th place Wilson in Division 2. Gowanda lost to Newfane 37-29 after beating Wilson 59-18 in the Consolation Rounds. Previously, the had lost a Semi-Final match to Chautauqua Lake 73-0.
Gowanda was also represented at the Ripley Invitational on the 6th. Gowanda’s Kiernan Quinn took a 2nd place in the girls 152 weight class. She registered pins in both Championship Round 1 and the Semi-Final Round. Those wins came, respectively, against Anahi DeJesus (Dunkirk, 1:34) and Avary LeGrano (Fredonia, 3:42). In the 1st Place Match, Quinn dropped a 17-8 Major Decision to Bella Andes (Lockport).