Boys Prep Basketball: 15th straight loss for Elverado's boys

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[The New Athens Yellowjackets and the Valle Catholic Warriors of nearby

Sainte Genevieve, MO advanced in the opening night of the 48th annual Chester Invitational Boys Basketball Tournament.

In Monday night's opener, New Athens defeated Elverado 52-30.

The game marked the return of former Chester coach Mark Riley who is now the JV coach and varsity assistant coach at Elverado.

New Athens raced out to a 19-3 lead after the first quarter thanks to nine first quarter points from Vince Kiefer.

The Yellowjackets outscored Elverado 12-11 in the second and took a 31-14 lead the locker room at halftime.

In the third, New Athens' Tyler Womack scored nine of his game high 20 points in the third quarter to help the Yellowjackets take a 43-30 lead heading to the fourth.

In addition to Womack's 20 point performance, Kiefer finished with 12 while Cody Gaubatz finished with 10 points for New Athens.

Kyle Kempfer led Elverado with 15 points. Landry Arnett finished with five and Jake Lipe finished with four. Kyle Whittington, Dalton Porter and Brian McClanahan each had two.

On Thursday night, in one championship semi final, Valle Catholic will play New Athens at 6pm.

Friday night, in one consolation semifinal, Valley Park will play 0-15 Elverado at 6:00pm.

The opening round concludes Tuesday night. The defending CIT champs, the Saxony Lutheran Crusaders will play the Dongola Demons at 6pm followed by Marissa-Coulterville playing the host Chester Yellow Jackets at 7:30pm.