Basketball Recap: Iola Comes Up Short

Iola fought the good fight in their overtime game against Caney Valley on Thursday but wound up with a less-than-desirable result. They fell just short of the Caney Valley Bullpups by a score of 80-77. Despite running the score up even higher than they did in their prior game back in December of 2024 (56), the Mustangs still had to take the loss.

When it comes to explaining why Iola lost, don't look at Cortland Carson. Despite the final result, he went 10 of 22 en route to 29 points and five boards. That was a full 37.7% of Iola's points, marking the third time in a row he's posted more than a third of the team's points. Another player making a difference was Matt Beckmon, who went 5 for 6 on his way to 13 points.

Iola now has a losing record at 3-4. As for Caney Valley, the win (which was their fifth in a row) raised their record to 5-2.

Iola has already played their next match (against Wellsville), but no score has been uploaded at the time of writing. Caney Valley will have some time to savor their victory since their next game is a little ways off: they'll take on Eureka at 7:00 p.m. on January 28th.