Metro Sports Report

It was high school basketball at its best

Let's start out with a salute to the 100 years of boys state basketball tournaments. Yes, it's again state tournament time and again Cedar Rapids will be well-represented in the 4A classification with Linn-Mar and Jefferson.

I guess we should start out by going over how the Lions and J-Hawks got there.

With Linn-Mar's victory in two overtimes Tuesday at a jam-packed Prairie gym, Susie and I got to see one of the most remarkable high school tournament games that in my view has ever been played. The setting, the enthusiasm, the drama, the electricity made for a memorable high school tournament contest.

And again, the Picasso of high school basketball in Marcus Paige prevailed in Linn-Mar's two-overtime win, 83-77, over Kennedy. In my view, it was a game that neither team deserved to lose, one of those rare moments when high school athletics was at its best.

Marcus Paige foiled his own curtain call

Linn-Mar Coach Chris Robertson had a fleeting thought Tuesday night when it looked like the Lions might lose in the substate finals to Cedar Rapids Kennedy.

This could be it, he realized. This could be Marcus Paige's final game for the Lions. And if so, he thought his star player deserved a chance to receive a final standing ovation from the fans.

Robertson began thinking about calling a timeout in the waning seconds of a lost cause so Paige could leave the game to a round of applause. He had a brief conversation with his assistant coaches when the situation looked bleak.

Ankeny pokes Saints in the eye, 39-25

DES MOINES - Emily Walvoord had red watery bloodshot eyes after the Xavier Saints lost to Ankeny in the state basketball tournament Wednesday, but it wasn't from crying.

Walvoord got elbowed in the eye in the first half and missed a chunk of playing time. "I was seeing triple," she said. "I can look straight ahead fine, but the side is blurry."

That summed up the day for the fifth-ranked Saints as they lost to fourth-ranked Ankeny, 39-25, in the quarterfinals of the Class 4A tournament at Wells Fargo Arena.

Things looked a little blurry for Xavier, which was held to its lowest point total of the season in its biggest game of the year. The Saints scored only three points in the second quarter and did not score during the first four minutes of the fourth period.

"What we ran into was a very experienced state tournament team," said Xavier Coach Tom Lilly. "They experienced the state tournament the last three years and they certainly knew how to respond to it and how to play on the big stage.

Re-Marcus-able! Paige hits 49 in 2OT

Marcus Paige is a supremely confident athlete, but even Paige had his doubts Tuesday night.

Linn-Mar trailed Kennedy by eight points with 30 seconds left in the substate finals and Paige could see his glittering high school career coming to an end.

"There was a moment when I was getting a little nervous," he admitted later.

Superman donned his cape just in time.

Incredibly, Paige scored nine points in the last 26 seconds of the fourth quarter and willed the fifth-ranked Lions to a scintillating 83-77 victory in double-overtime before a standing-room-only crowd at the Prairie High School gym.