Staff photo by Travis Rosenau Sibley East’s Nate Colling goes for the ball alongside Gibbon-Fairfax-Winthrop’s Cole Jacobson on Tuesday night in a nonconference boys basketball game at GFW High School in Winthrop.

WINTHROP – The Sibley East Wolverines turned defense into offense early and often Tuesday night as they ran away from the Gibbon-Fairfax-Winthrop Thunderbirds for a 65-43 win in a nonconference boys basketball game.

The Thunderbirds got off to a quick 4-0 start on drives inside by Clayton Karg and Easton Taylor before Sibley East answered with a 3 from Quintin DeVlaeminck, who had five 3s in the game and led his team with 20 points. Cole Jacobson, who finished with 10 points, kept GFW in front by scoring his team’s next two buckets, but the Wolverines started getting some takeaways and quickly took a 10-8 lead after a steal and layup by DeVlaeminck and a 3 from Evan Pautsch.

Pautsch ended with 10 points, six rebounds, four steals and three assists.

The Wolverines, who opened the season with a win at home over GFW, expected GFW to come out in Tuesday’s game more aggressive and were ready for it.

“I told the guys that they’re going to come out looking for blood … they’re going to play tough, they’re going to play hard, so we’re going to have to step up our defense, we have to rebound better, we have to look to attack the basket,” Sibley East head coach Dave Halquist said. “We struggled a little bit at first, we were kind of hesitant, but then we kind of picked up in the second half, started cutting to the basket.”

Turnovers began to pile up on the Thunderbirds after falling behind. Back-to-back turnovers didn’t hurt the Thunderbirds until they committed a third consecutive turnover that led to another 3 by DeVlaeminck and a 23-13 Wolverines lead that prompted GFW head coach Ryan Jacobson to burn a timeout with 6:41 left in the opening half.

“We had a bunch of unforced errors,” coach Jacobson said. “And field goal percentage – when you don’t shoot the ball real well, you need to get as many shots on goal as possible and we did not help ourselves in that category.”

After Taylor, who led GFW on the night with 16 points, hit a 3 to have his team down 23-16, the Wolverines answered with a corner 3 from Ezra Weber to take their double-digit lead back. Weber finished the game with 16 points, five rebounds and a pair of steals.

The Wolverines led 33-20 at halftime.

A corner 3 by Weber and a pair of free throws from Jack Feterl gave the Wolverines their largest lead of the game late in the second half, 64-37.

Coach Jacobson said despite the loss, he was happy with his team’s effort and also happy with how his young team competed against Sleepy Eye on Monday at home, a 57-51 loss.

“Other than Cole and Easton, none of [our] guys played a ton of varsity minutes last year, so they’re just learning the pace at which the game is played at and the intensity level that it’s played at,” coach Jacobson said. “We’re making strides in the right direction. I felt [Monday] night against [Sleepy Eye] Public, I felt good about how we competed in that game. But we’ve got to find a way to put the ball in the basket a little more efficiently.”

Nate Colling didn’t get into the points column for Sibley East on Tuesday but did finish leading the team in steals with five.

While there may not be any parties thrown for winning their fifth game of the season, the Wolverines (5-5) have come a long way since last year when they finished with just five wins all last season.

“These guys absolutely love to play basketball,” Halquist said. “This group of seniors have been playing together since they were probably first grade. Credit to the parents for taking them to tournaments a lot, getting them exposed there, but these guys absolutely love to play the game, they love to compete and I think that’s the biggest benefit that they have, that’s there biggest asset. And even if they get their butts whooped one night, they’ll come out with more intensity to take it out on the other team the next night.

“We had our first big win against GFW the first game of the season and then we dropped the next three by 30-plus points, but then we came back and won some more. Last season they won five games all season long, we’re at five wins this year already, so it’s a good feeling, a good feeling to give them some success.”

Sibley East is at St. Clair on Friday, while GFW (3-6) hosts New Ulm Cathedral on Friday night.