Boys Prep Basketball:Elverado's loss skid screeches to a halt !
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[The New Athens Yellowjackets won the annual Chester Invitational Tournament for the 10th time in the 48 year history of the oldest boys' basketball tournament in southern Illinois.
In the championship game, the Yellowjackets defeated Cahokia Conference foe Marissa-Coulterville 54-46.
The championship game was the fourth and final game of a full day of basketball at Daniel Colbert Memorial Gym which wrapped up two full weeks of basketball tournament hosted by Chester High School.
In the first game of the day, the Valley Park, MO Hawks raced out to a huge first half lead and defeated Dongola 69-28 for seventh place.
The Chester Yellow Jackets improved to 5-10 on the season with a 74-49 decision over the Elverado Falcons (1-17) in the consolation final.
The Yellow Jackets led start to finish, jumping out to a 21-13 lead after the first quarter and then pushed their lead to 47-26 at halftime after outscoring the Falcons 26-13 in the second quarter.
Lochhead led Chester with a game high 21 points. Aaron Grah tossed in 15 points while MJ Hamilton finished with 12.
Daulton Porter led Elverado with nine points. Kyle Kempfer finished with seven while Bryce Mathis and Ben Kempfer each had six points.
Making their first appearance in the Chester Invitational Tournament, the
Valle Catholic Warriors of nearby Ste. Genevieve, MO, left Chester Saturday night with the third place trophy after beating Saxony Lutheran of Jackson, MO 50-36.
After the team trophies were handed out, the 10-member All Tournament Team was announced. The team includes Mike Lloyd and Casey Pitchford of Marissa, Zach Lochhead of Chester, Michael Loida of Valle Catholic, Elverado's Kyle Kempfer, Brayton Klaus of Saxony Lutheran, Tyler Womack of New Athens and Josh Ramsey of Valley Park.
As voted by coaches and members of the media the 2010 Chester Invitational's Most Valuable Player is Vince Kiefer of New Athens.
In the first game Friday night, the Elverado Falcons snapped a long losing streak by beating the Valley Park, Hawks 55-43.
The Falcons led 13-10 after the first quarter but Valley Park outscored Elverado 12-9 in the second to send the game to the locker room at halftime tied at 22-22.
Each team scored 13 points in the third quarter, sending the game tied at 36-36 to a wild fourth quarter finish.
In the final eight minutes, Elverado's Jake Lipe was hit was a double-technical and ejected from the game after he and a Valley Park player exchanged words following a shot block. Lipe had to be restrained by his teammates before he was hit with a second technical and tossed out of the game.
The ejection of Lipe seemed to fire up his teammates as Elverado took control from that point on. The Falcons outscored the Hawks 19-7 in the fourth quarter to win the game 55-43. Kyle Kempfer led Elverado with a game high 24 points. Landry Arnett finished with seven while Dalton Porter and Jake Lipe each had six points.