Oskaloosa’s reign as State 3A boys’ basketball champions is over.  Pella defeated the Indians 62-51 Monday night (3/2) in Knoxville to win the 3A Substate 6 championship and advance to next week’s State tournament.  The Indians and Dutch fought tooth and nail for three quarters.  Oskaloosa led by three at halftime and by six midway through the fourth quarter….before Pella went off on a 10-0 run to take a lead they would never lose.  The Dutch kept it going in the fourth quarter, as senior Logan Shetterly scored 29 points and classmate Treyton Sturgeon added 13 for Pella.  Oskaloosa Coach Ryan Parker said when Pella began using a full court press in the third quarter, it made a difference in the game.

“We did some uncharacteristic things.  Our pregame scouting report said ‘Stay in the moment; don’t play outside yourself.’ At the end of the day, that press…..the easiest thing to do when you’re getting pressed is to shoot it.  We didn’t handle the ball extremely well there in the third and fourth quarter and that came back to cost us.”

Pella will take a 19-5 record into the 3A boys State tournament next week.  Oskaloosa ends the season with a 10-14 record.  Parker talked about his seven seniors.

“I talked about every one of my seniors in my post-game speech, everything they’ve contributed over the four years.  They’ve got nothing to be disappointed about, they can’t hang their heads.  They won a State title, not many people do that.  They played four straight Substate finals, not many teams do that.  And I talked with each one of them about what they’ve contributed to this program. And at the end of the day, we’ve got to look at Xavier Foster.  He was a complete program-changer for us. We called it Xavier Foster effect, filling gyms in the away games and home games, changing shots at the rim.  I’ll probably never coach a kid again like that.”

Xavier Foster ended his Oskaloosa career with 23 points as he takes his talents to Iowa State University next season.

Five other teams advanced to the 3A boys’ State basketball tournament Monday:  Norwalk–last year’s State runner-up, Harlan, Sergeant Bluff-Luton, Center Point-Urbana and Mount Vernon.  The rest of the Class 3A field will be determined Wednesday night (3/4).  Pella will learn who their first opponent at State will be on Thursday morning (3/5).