After falling behind by 15 points in the first half of Monday’s district quarterfinal at Hillcrest, Holy Trinity was building momentum in the third quarter with a 12-5 run. 

Crusader forward Mike DiPrima jumped in front of a Raven pass and raced toward the basket. DiPrima’s layup found the net, but Hillcrest senior Aiden Krabill had beaten him down the court, drawing a charge to keep the points off the scoreboard.

DiPrima fouled out of the game with two minutes left in the third quarter, and the Crusaders would not score another field goal until Hillcrest emptied its bench eight minutes later with a 31-point lead. 

Krabill finished with six points as the Ravens moved on to the district semifinal with a 61-36 victory. 

“I'm kind of a fan of the dirty work,” Krabill said. “(Coach Dwight Gingerich) would always say, ‘that's an effort play right there.’ So I’ve just always kind of wanted to do that. And I just found myself in front of the big guy, lowering his shoulder.”

Hillcrest led just 9-8 late in the first quarter before the Ravens went on a 20-6 run. Grant Bender did most of his work in the post and at the free throw line, scoring 10 points in the second quarter. He had 14 more during a 22-1 run in the second half, finishing one point shy of a career high with 29 on his 17th birthday. 

"Things kind of came together at  both ends,” Gingerich said. “They were struggling to make shots, we were rebounding the ball pretty well. And then at the offensive end, we were patient.

“I thought Grant was effective in just sort of letting things come to him. He slowed things down a little bit and took advantage on penetration there several times.”

Luke Schrock hit a 3-pointer during the Ravens’ second quarter run and scored the first four points of the second half for Hillcrest. He finished with 12 points. 

“He was attacking,” Gingerich said. (Schrock and Bender) were playing together pretty well right through there. Grant had a nice pass to Luke for the finish, and Luke is pretty effective around the basket.”

Jace Rempel scored the first points of the game with a 3-pointer and finished with five. Seth Ours answered a Holy Trinity score with a 3-pointer to give Hillcrest a 12-8 lead after one quarter. He hit another triple during the fourth-quarter run. 

“I thought the ball moved better later,” Gingerich said. “Jace Rempel, I thought played well. Seth Ours did a nice job. You know, Seth is a freshman kind of running the show for us. They're coming after him, and I think he's just getting better every game.

Sophomore Conner Gehling led the Crusaders with 11 points. 

With the win over Holy Trinity (6-16), the Ravens (15-6) move on to face the conference champion Winfield-Mt. Union (20-2), in a district semifinal on Thursday, February 17. 

Hillcrest led 21-19 at halftime of the first meeting on January 7, before falling 42-33. Thursday’s matchup will be in Winfield, where the Wolves beat the Ravens 54-28 just one week ago. 

“We were down there last week and had a tough night,” Gingerich said. “So we've got some things to correct and hopefully can rest a little bit and come back and be ready to go on Thursday. It's going to take a great effort on our part, and we're excited for the challenge.”