Hays again too much for Buffs, boys dropped 64-45

Story Credit: GCHS Athletics

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After a blowout win on Tuesday at home against Dodge City, the Garden City Buffaloes had hoped to carry some of that momentum into the Thursday road game at Hays High.

But the Buffaloes and head coach Luke Swedberg didn’t have an answer for the Indians’ blazing start when they hit 9-of-11 field goals to jump out to an early 20-7 lead and never looked back that resulted in a 64-45 triumph in a Western Athletic Conference contest.

“I looked up at the scoreboard with a minute and a half left in the first quarter and realized that was the first (field goal) miss for Hays,” Swedberg said. “I just thought we started slow both on offense and defense and our pace was not as good as it was in the Dodge game.”

The Buffs saw their overall season record dip to 10-11 and they are now 3-4 in the WAC while Hays, leading the WAC at 6-0, is 16-4 overall. The Buffs will close out their regular season home schedule next Tuesday, Feb. 24, when they host Liberal at The Garden.

They will play a final regular season game at Wichita Southeast on Feb. 27, a game added to the schedule when the Buffs’ final contest at the Valley Center January Jam was called off because of a winter storm. Class 6A sub-states will be played on March 3 at the team with the higher seed. There will be four, four-team sub-states in the West.

“We just need to re-focus and take some steps forward to get ready for these last two games and then prepare for the playoffs,” Swedberg said. “Hays is really good at crashing the boards and gets a lot of second shots. They’re big and relentless and we didn’t match that intensity.”

Early in the first quarter, the Buffs had stayed close when Braden Jagels knocked down a 3-pointer for a 6-5 deficit, but then the Indians reeled off 10 straight points and finished the quarter on a 14-2 run.

To start the second quarter, Drew Strecker nailed a 3-pointer but then the fire alarm went off in the Hays school building, forcing an evacuation of the gymnasium at 7:58 p.m.

The school went through its fire alarm security check and the game re-started at 8:18 p.m. It didn’t seem to affect the play of either team.

“We just went to our locker room,” Swedberg said. “But things didn’t change when we came back out to re-start. But it was certainly a weird situation to clear the gym.”

Midway through the second, the Buffs had hung around, trailing 24-16 before another run by the Indians produced a 10-4 finish and a 34-20 Hays lead at intermission.

The third quarter only extended the Hays lead as the Indians outscored the Buffs 17-8 in the period for a 51-28 advantage heading to the fourth. The biggest Hays lead was 26 before the Buffs closed the game on a 10-3 run.

Sophomore guard Koby Rosales led the Buffs with 19 points while senior forward Jalen Jagels added 10. For Hays, 6-6 post Dawson Ruder was the big gun with 17 points while Izaac Fox added 13. Fox had scored 22 points in the Indians’ 55-34 win at Garden City on Jan. 16.

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Western Athletic Conference
Game #7
Thursday, Feb. 19
At Hays High School

HAYS 64, GARDEN CITY 45
Garden City (45) — Rosales 7 5-7 19, Morales 1 0-0 2, Chairez 2 0-2 6, B. Jagels 1 0-0 3, J. Jagels 5 0-1 10, Strecker 2 0-0 5. Totals 18 5-10 45.
Hays (64) — Pfeifer 1 1-2 3, Homeier 1 0-0 2, Oakley 4 3-3 11, Harmoney 3 0-0 9, Fox 5 3-3 13, Day 3 1-1 7, Ruder 5 6-6 17, Loving 1 0-0 2. Totals 23 14-15 64.

Garden City (10-11/3-4)…7…13…8…17…–…45
Hays (16-4/6-0)…20…14…17…13…–…61

3-point goals—Garden City 4 (J. Jagels 1, Strecker 1, Chairez 2); Hays 3 (Harmoney 2, Ruder 1). Fouls—Garden City 15. Hays: 10. Fouled out–Garden City (Strecker).