Saxony Lutheran boys basketball team grounds Woodland in Class 3 District 3 quarterfinal

PARK HILLS, Mo. -- Saxony Lutheran boys basketball coach Dane Church and forward Gabe Bohnert were less than enthusiastic about their Class 3 District 3 quarterfinal win over Woodland on Saturday.

"I didn't think we were ready to go," Church said. "From the start, we were pretty laid back and careless. They didn't do anything special on defense. We just didn't move the ball very well on offense and our defense just has to get better."

The No. 3 seeded Crusaders won 63-49 but picked apart their performance after the game.

"We were kind of slow and off our game, but I'm glad we came away with the victory," Bohnert said. "We were just behind. We were slow on everything. We weren't helping out on our defense with each other. It was just bad."

Saxony Lutheran never trailed in the game, but it wasn't until the latter part of the third quarter that the Crusaders started to put some distance between themselves and No. 6 seed Woodland (7-16).

Saxony Lutheran led 28-23 at halftime, but Woodland made five of its first six shots in the second half to tie the game at 32-32 with 5 minutes, 18 seconds left in the third quarter.

After his team scored on its next possession, Church took a timeout and "kind of got on to" his team, according to Bohnert.

"We played a couple defenses tonight, but I told our guys the bottom line is keeping your man in front of you," Church said. "We've talked about it all year and continually we have guys just let their man drive right by them to the basket. That just hurts us. It kills us. Hopefully we get this game out of our system and play better on Tuesday, but when our shots aren't falling, especially in the first half like they weren't, our defense just has to be there, and tonight it was pretty bad."

Bohnert provided the answer for Saxony Lutheran's offense. He scored 30 points, most of which came from the paint. No other Crusaders player had more than eight points.

"We knew they didn't have much height, so we wanted to work the ball inside," Bohnert said. "It was opened up pretty early. My teammates found me, so I was just lucky to score."

Woodland coach Robert Stein said his team had focused on stopping Bohnert.

"Defensively we keyed on Bohnert and he still had [30] points, so that's kind of frustrating," Stein said. "Just an athletic and size mismatch. We did a good job for about the first three minutes, but we had three guys with three fouls trying to do it. With his quickness and his matchup for us, after we got in foul trouble with guards, it was really hard to guard him."

Saxony Lutheran scored five consecutive points after Woodland tied the game.

"Our last four or five games have been similar to that," Stein said. "Puxico and Advance, where they'd get a lead on us and we'd fight to make it back into a basketball game and stay there for a little while. Then we would have a lapse for another 20 or 30 seconds and they'd get a big lead on us again."

Lance Yount, who led Woodland with 18 points, was the only senior on the Cardinals' roster.

"Our guys, just right now, we're young, and to beat a good team we have to play without mistakes -- mental and physical -- all the time, not most of the time," Stein said.

Saxony Lutheran will play No. 2 seed Clearwater at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday.

Woodland 7 16 14 2 -- 49

Saxony 11 17 17 8 -- 63

WOODLAND (49) -- Aaron Yount 7, Tyler Yount 5, Garret Reynolds 7, Dylan Miller 8, Lance Yount 18. FG 17, FT 10-13, F 18. (3-pointers: T. Yount 1. Fouled out: T. Yount, L. Yount)

SAXONY LUTHERAN (63) -- Trent Steffens 8, Logan Sprandel 6, Clayton Carver 8, Taylor Johnson 5, Gabe Bohnert 30, Nick Johnson 6. (3-pointers: T. Steffens 1, T. Johnson 1. Fouled out: none)