WEST DES MOINES - With Marshalltown traveling to Des Moines Hoover in about nine days, girls' basketball coach Tim Johnson didn't want to show too much to the Huskies during the 65th Annual CIML Kiwanis Basketball Jamboree on Saturday at Valley High School.
Instead, the Bobcats ran one offensive set and showed one defensive look in the 16 minutes of action during a 25-23 loss.
"We weren't going to show them much because we turn around and play them soon again," Johnson said. "We expect that game to be competitive so we didn't want to give anything away."
T-R PHOTO BY TROY HYDE
MHS sophomore Rachel Blagg, right, drives to the bucket against Des Moines Hoover on Saturday during the CIML basketball jamboree at West Des Moines Valley High School. The Huskies beat the Bobcats 25-23.
The Bobcats also did not have the services of senior point guard Taylor Wagner, who sat out with the flu.
Without Wagner and with some pretty vanilla sets being run on the floor, Johnson was pleased with the effort for the most part.
"It was a good showing for a first time out," he said. "We played great defense today. We missed some easy shots and need to get into better shape, but other than that I thought we played pretty well."
While conditioning needs improvement, Johnson also thinks a four-quarter game against the Huskies could favor his squad. Hoover seemed gassed late in the half on defense, which allowed for easy looks at the basket.
"We had a lot of red faces out there, but they were even more tired than we were," Johnson said. "We used more players so hopefully we can wear them down when we play them next week."
The Bobcats open the season Tuesday at home against Des Moines, which is one of the three teams Marshalltown defeated last year along with Hoover and Fort Dodge. Marshalltown then travels to Hoover to play a girl-boy doubleheader on Nov. 27.
Hoover began the exhibition with five straight points as Marshalltown did not get on the board until 3:20 in the contest.
Junior Amanda Hughes tied the game though at 5 when she buried a triple and connected on another long jumper on back-to-back possessions.
Nyakat Diew put the Huskies back in front with a three-point later a few minutes later and then gave Hoover a five-point lead with another bucket inside. That was the largest lead of the game for either squad.
Marshalltown senior Eisha Oden kept it close for the Bobcats as she converted buckets on two straight possessions to close the gap to just one point. It stayed a one-point game with four minutes to play after Oden canned two freebies, and then freshman Ellyn Boland gave the Bobcats their only lead of the day at 21-20 after she sunk a bucket inside.
The game was tied at 23-23 following two free throws by senior Lauren Mazour with 1:42 left, but Hoover's Malaysia Duncan hit a jumper with 1:20 to play to give Hoover the win.
Marshalltown had a few chances to tie the game after that, but the Bobcats could not convert. However, Johnson did not set up anything other than the one set they ran offensively. He'll save the rest for the regular season contest in nine days.
"We scored all of our points other than free throws out of that one set," Johnson said. "That's what we wanted to do today. We are going to need to start making some of those easy looks we have though."
Oden led the Bobcats with six points. Hughes finished with five points, Mazour and Boland both scored four, while sophomores Rachel Blagg and Sam Hughes had two each.
Mikayla Larson led Hoover with eight points, while Diew collected seven points in the paint.