RAMS, HAWKS ARRANGE BIG 2A SHOWDOWN; KELLY PUTS BULLDOGS' SEASON TO SLEEP 78-63

BLOOMFIELD -- For the Kelly Hawks, the best things in life are free. And their donations at the free-throw line bought them a spot in the Class 2A, District 2 championship game.

The Hawks (18-8) made 34 of 42 foul shots for the game and Notre Dame shot poorly from the field as No. 2 Kelly routed No. 3 Notre Dame 78-63 Thursday night.

The win sets the stage for a Scott City-Kelly final, which will be played at 8:15 tonight.

Scott City has taken two games over Kelly this season, but it took overtime for the top-seeded Rams to knock off the Hawks in their last meeting.

After a defensive-oriented first half -- the score was just 24-15 at halftime -- both teams lit the scoreboard in the final two quarters.

Notre Dame scored 48 points in the second half, but never closed the gap to less than eight points.

Kelly scored 23 in the third quarter and 31 in the fourth as it protected and built on its lead.

The Hawks took a 47-36 into the fourth quarter and Notre Dame never got closer than nine points down the stretch.

"We didn't play too well defensively in the fourth quarter," said Kelly point guard Jamie Essner. "We were scoring so I guess we didn't need to really. But we played pretty good defense in the first half."

Kelly standout Jim Hulshof scored a game-high 29 points, making 16 of his 17 free throws.

Essner followed with 17, while Russ Mothershead had 12 and Jason Glastetter had 10.

Kelly coach Kent Mangels said the large amount of free throws simply meant the Hawks executed their offense.

"We try to work our offense so we get an opportunity to get the ball inside and get fouled," Mangels said. "We stress getting the mismatch and I thought our kids did a nice job of that tonight. They got some big buckets just because they found the mismatches.

"We like to make more (free throws) than they shoot."

For Notre Dame, Anthony Ressel scored 16, followed by Zach Miller with 11 and Michael Wehner with 10.

Notre Dame was cold in the first half, hitting just five of its 25 shots from the field. For the game, Notre Dame made 26 shots in 69 attempts. The Bulldogs missed all nine of their 3-point attempts in the first half and made 2 of 19 for the game.

"You're not going to win many games when you shoot the ball like that," Notre Dame coach Chris Janet said. "When you don't shoot well it wears on you. We got good enough looks at the basket, we just didn't put the ball in the hole and that really hurt us.

"If we would've hit some early, I think we would've been just fine."

The win was especially gratifying for the Hawks considering the amount of injuries they've fought through to get to the district finals.

But in a way, the injuries may have been a blessing in disguise. Especially for Essner who started the season on the junior varsity team.

"Whenever Jim went out (with a stress fracture) someone had to step up at point guard," Essner said. "We had to move some people around so I got my chance there.

"Jamie has come so far," Mangels said. "He's playing with confidence. Our senior point guard Daniel Mothershead has been bothered by a knee injury all year and he was the kid we were counting on. Jamie came on early in the year and played well then he had a bad stretch and I sat him down for a while. But every since I've brought him back, he's done a super job for our ball club."