KELLY DEFEATS HOST TO WIN ORAN TOURNAMENT

ORAN -- Since winning their last Oran Invitational Tournament in 1981, the Kelly Hawks basketball team had made it to the tourney final four different times without claiming the title.

Friday night against the third seed and host Oran Eagles, the top-seeded Hawks got a fantastic game from Denver Stuckey to claim the championship 87-59.

Stuckey scored 28 points to lead the Hawks to the title. Kelly also got double digit scoring from Jim Hulshof with 19, Jason Glastetter 14, and Ben Klipfel 10.

Oran's Daniel Wheeler dropped in three 3-pointers and led the Eagles with 11 points.

"The other kids really worked hard with Denver," said Kelly coach Kent Mangles. "We have really good balance. You can't really key on any one player with us, because we have other guys that can step up."

Apparently it was Stuckey's night to shine for the Hawks. The senior point guard, despite playing out of control at times, fired in 16 points in the first half to push the Hawks to a 36-29 halftime lead.

"Denver forced some things in the first half, but in the second half he let the game flow to him," Mangles said. "He made some adjustments and really got into the flow of the game."

The Hawks led the entire second half and used a 35-point fourth-quarter to pull away in the end. Kelly won all three of its tournament games by over 29 points.

"We played well here," said Mangels. "But we have our work cut out for us with our schedule."

Kelly led most of the first quarter before Oran mounted a small rally to push ahead. The Eagles took their first lead of the game late in the quarter on a basket by Chris Nichols to make the score 16-15.

Two Stuckey free throws put Kelly back ahead 17-16, but Rickey Eftink scored at the end of quarter to put the Eagles up 18-17 after the first eight minutes.

Kelly used an 11-3 run at the start of the second quarter that put them ahead to stay. The Hawks held a 36-29 advantage at halftime and pushed that lead to 52-41 after three quarters.

Jerod Hamm and Dustin Dannenmueller added 10 points each for Oran.

Scott Central 78, Puxico 64

Scott County Central led 39-31 at halftime and 64-47 after three quarters before winning the third-place game.

Central sophomore Jreece Johnson led all scorers with 23 points. John Fort added 18 and Travis Blackman and Jason Gipson each had 13.

Mike Owens led Puxico with 22 points.

Twin Rivers 55, Bell City 49

Sixth-seeded Twin Rivers held off a fourth-quarter charge by fifth-seeded Bell City to win the consolation championship.

Twin Rivers led 26-15 at halftime and 40-32 after three quarters before the Cubs made it close in the final quarter.

Justin Stephens scored a game-high 17 points for Bell City and Brandon Stewart added 12. Justin Mosier paced Twin Rivers with 16 points.