No stopping Niekamp

ST. HENRY - Parkway coach Doug Hughes thought long and hard about how to defend St. Henry's Caden Niekamp before Friday's game.

"As you look at how to game plan against him, do you three-quarter?" Hughes said. "Do you front or do you play behind? Well, if you front him, all they've got do is shoot the basketball and there's a good chance we're going to struggle getting the rebound if he really wants it. If you play behind like we chose to do, you're not taking anything away. You're pretty much just conceding the pass into the post and then you're at his mercy. And we didn't feel like on tape that we could double because he's such a good passer. He's probably a better passer than he is at any other part of his game."

Scoring was the best part of his game on Friday.

The St. Henry big man scored a career-high 25 points and added eight rebounds as the Redskins pulled away from the Panthers in the second half for a 60-44 victory.

"I thought Caden was terrific," St. Henry coach Eric Rosenbeck said. "He was playing motivated basketball. When he puts his mind to it, he can really be a force on the inside, on the outside and as many coaches have seen on film, he can really does an excellent job passing the ball. In all three phases, he was phenomenal."

The fourth-ranked Redskins (13-3, 5-1 MAC) remained tied for first in the conference with Marion Local (9-5, 5-1), winning their fifth straight game. Parkway (7-8, 1-5) had its two-game winning streak ended.

Four players had three-or-more points for Parkway in the first quarter. Caleb Kinney, coming off a 27-point game against Lincolnview last week, scored seven in the frame, Mason Baxter and Jack Wehe had four apiece and Dylan Hughes knocked down a 3-pointer. Caden Niekamp scored nine of 16 points in the first for St. Henry, which faced a two-point deficit after one.

Caden Niekamp tied the score with two free throws early in the second. A jumper by Zach Niekamp gave St. Henry the lead for good. It was still a one-point game, 20-19 Redskins, when Riley Link drove and banked home a left-handed layup while drawing a foul. He completed the and-1, Andrew Lange and Zach Niekamp followed with makes as St. Henry went on a half-closing 16-7 run, punctuated Sam Hartings' jumper at the buzzer.

"I thought that we made some poor decisions with the basketball," Hughes said. "They got us turned over a couple times there, and it kind of turned the tide in the second quarter. You look at the final stats, I don't think we had a lot of turnovers. But they sped us up and we took some quick shots and had a couple turnovers. The second quarter ended up being a pivotal point in the game."

St. Henry upped its lead to 18 with two minutes left in the third quarter, as Caden Niekamp added seven more points. Parkway was off the mark most of the quarter, until Caden Slusher hit back-to-back 3s to end the frame and make the deficit 12.

It never got closer in the fourth, though.

St. Henry had six players score at least four points, including Zach Niekamp (nine), Jay Knapke (eight), Link (five), Lange (five) and Hartings (four). As for Caden Niekamp, he finished 10 of 16 shooting and 2 of 3 from deep.

"In the first half, we tried to stay behind him," Hughes said. "In the second half, we tried the three-quarter. Tomorrow, I still wouldn't know what to do. He's just a really solid player."

Kinney had a team-high 16 points for Parkway. Preston Stober added eight.

After going 7 of 15 from the field in the first quarter, Parkway made just nine additional shots. The Panthers finished 16 of 40 shooting and 4 of 17 from 3.

"I'm really, really happy with the defensive side of the ball in periods two through four," Rosenbeck said. "We had two lapses at the end of the third. Slusher made us pay with two long 3s. Then we had a 60-second lull when we were up 20 that was really frustrating. With that being said, they have some guys who can put the ball in the hole. I thought we did a really good job of being mentally tough and sticking with it on defense.

"I'm also really proud of guys like Riley Link, Sam Hartings and Andrew Lange coming off the bench and giving us big minutes, because we mixed up between some of our half-court defenses, full-court, man, some 2-2-1," Rosenbeck added. "Doing all that is a lot on the guys to make sure they're mentally into it, but they were ready and they delivered tonight."

Both teams are back in action tonight. Parkway hosts South Adams while St. Henry visits Celina.