ST. PAUL – For the Altoona-Midway Middle School Jets, it was a long night after a long layoff.
The St. Paul Indians steamrolled AMMS 80-17 in a Mineral Belt League mismatch here Monday night. The Jets, forced to postpone last week’s contest with Thayer due to weather, had not played a game since Dec. 19 – and it showed.
“The rust from our winter break was evident. This was by far our worst outing of the season,” said AMMS head coach David Batzer. “We had 40 turnovers and gave up 19 offensive rebounds. That’s a recipe for disaster, which sums up tonight's game really well.
“We had been doing much better with our press break, but tonight we took a step backward,” Batzer added. “Our guards tried to do too much one-on-one instead of making good passes. We’ve got to make better decisions with the basketball.
“As a coach, I’ll shoulder the blame for this one,” he continued. “It’s my job to have the team ready to play and we were far from it.”
St. Paul scored early and often, as they led 29-7 at the quarter and 50-13 at halftime. The Indians continued the offensive barrage with a 30-4 advantage in the second half to build the 80-17 final score.
S. Born and B. Adey scorched the nets for 24 and 23 points, respectively, for St. Paul, while R. Born fired in 16.
Caden Sicka reached double digits for Altoona-Midway, finishing with 10 points. Zach Good chipped in five points and six rebounds and Eliot Ard added two points.
“We did shoot well from the free throw line (5-for-6) if there is a silver lining to be found in this,” Batzer said. “I told the team we just need to put the game behind us. We need to focus on our next opponent and continue to work on rebounding and ball security in practice so we don’t see this type of game again.”
St. Paul also won a “B” contest 27-2 and a “C” game 8-0. Broghan Douglas scored for the Jets in the “B” matchup.
“I truly believe this was an outlier,” Batzer added. “Too much time off was not good for us, but I know we’ll be a more competitive team on Thursday.”
Altoona-Midway, 1-4 on the season, will try to regroup Thursday when they host Meadowview. Tipoff is slated for 5 p.m. at Milo Peterson Gymnasium.