SMITHVILLE — The Heartland Christian boys were in over their heads at the Division VII district championship basketball game Saturday night.

Six-foot-6 senior Bradey Krichbaum totaled 26 points and 26 rebounds as third-seeded Jeromesville Hillsdale towered over little Heartland Christian, 73-54, at Smithville’s Berkey Fieldhouse.

“It was tough” Heartland sophomore Collin Kalaher said. “The one kid is especially big. We’re a young team and don’t have much size.

“We battled. We could have played with them if we played our best, but we didn’t.”

Heartland wraps up the season at 18-6, one win shy of the program’s most ever, winning 12 of the last 14 games.

“Our future is really bright,” Kalaher said.

The Lions have four sophomores in the top eight. They lose four seniors, but only Johnny Meyer as a starter.

“We’re going to get better,” Heartland coach Josh Scott said.

The Lions have to after falling in the district title game two straight seasons.

“We’re young,” Scott said. “Our group is going to have to get stronger.”

Hillsdale is big and strong, featuring several stars from the football team that reached the Division VII state championship game last fall.

“Their extended 2-3 zone caused us problems,” Scott said. “Size hurts us. We’re not a big team. They are.”

Hillsdale — celebrating its first district title since 2001 — improves to 19-6, scoring at least 70 points in six of the last eight games. The Falcons will take on Cornerstone Christian, led by Ohio’s all-time leading scorer Quinn Kwasniak, in a regional semifinal at 6 p.m. Tuesday at Barberton High School

The Falcons had a balanced scoring effort Saturday behind Krichbaum. Hayden McFadden collected 18 points, Troy Bennett 11 and Kael Lewis eight. Five-foot-4 freshman point guard Lowen Ferguson — the coach’s son — dished out 10 assists.

“You never know who is going to lead us,” Hillsdale coach Ben Ferguson said. “We’ve had six different leading scorers this season.”

Krichbaum and McFadden were first-team All-Ohio football players, while Lewis was a second-team All-Ohioan after a record-setting season at quarterback.

“We were overmatched inside and not shooting well,” Scott said. “For us, that is a recipe for disaster.”

Heartland was in the game until opening the second half missing 17 of its first 18 shots to fall behind 54-36 early in the fourth quarter.

“We’re young and in a district final against a team like Hillsdale,” Kalaher said. “We started the second half shooting 1-of-18, that’s not a recipe for success.”

Kalaher led the Lions with 21 points — 11 of them coming in the final 5 1/2 minutes.

“He’s a player,” Ferguson said. “He’s a shooter and a facilitator. He’s the complete package. We didn’t want to let him get going.”

Corban Seutia added 11 points and Brody Conaway nine.

“We didn’t know a lot about them,” Ferguson said. “We watched seven different games on tape. I knew they play really hard and can shoot the ball.”

Hillsdale never trailed, opening up a 10-3 lead less than three minutes into the game on three Krichbaum layups.

The Lions never were able to matchup as 28 of Hillsdale’s 33 baskets were layups.

Scott said the biggest player the Lions had seen this season before was Salem’s Evan Jones.

“(Krichbaum) is a more traditional inside player,” Scott said.

Heartland was within three points at 31-28 with two minutes left in the second quarter. But Lowen Ferguson banked in a three-pointer at the buzzer to widen the Falcon lead to 38-30 at halftime.

“I thought we really hurt them by our pace of play,” Ben Ferguson said. “I thought it caught up with them in the third quarter.”

The Lions forced the Falcons into seven turnovers in the third quarter and 10 more in the fourth quarter, but had trouble scoring. Heartland was 1-of-17 from the field in the third quarter and missed all 10 of its three-point attempts.

Heartland was 2-of-21 shooting in the second half to fall behind 56-38 before Kalaher made a pair of three-pointers.

A McFadden steal and breakaway dunk pushed the margin to 60-41 with 4:37 remaining.

“That was when I finally felt we were defeated,” Scott said. “I could see our shoulders slumping.”

Gridiron great

Kalaher was Austintown Fitch’s starting quarterback the second half of the season last fall.

He didn’t start playing football until the eighth grade at Fitch, but he was hurt that whole season with back and foot injuries.

Kalaher said he transferred to Heartland Christian after his parents divorced. He was the third-leading scorer on Heartland’s basketball team as a freshman.

“It’s a lot different,” he said. “My class at Fitch had 370-something. We have 30 here.”

Since Heartland does not offer football, students can play at other schools.

“My football coach came to a few basketball games,” Kalaher said.

Kalaher threw four touchdown passes to lead Fitch past Boardman, 45-28, in week nine.

He said he talks football with Heartland senior teammate Spencer Pruitt, who set Columbiana’s single-season rushing record in the fall.

“We do,” Kalaher said. “I know he had a great season. I watched his video.”

Game notes

¯ Hillsdale was doing Heartland a favor by shooting 2-of-9 from three-point range in the first half.

“That’s what we wanted,” Scott said. “But they were able to get rebounds.”

The Falcons stuck with the inside game in the second half, missing both of its three-point shots.

¯ How key is rebounding? Hillsdale had 25 turnovers, compared to 15 for Heartland, and the Falcons still attempted nine more shots.

¯ Kalaher said his younger brother, Reagan, will be a freshman on the basketball team next season.

“He’s already bigger than me,” he said.

The Lions need him to keep growing to about 6-foot-6.

¯ Hillsdale beat Southern Local, 86-14, in a sectional tournament game last year. It set a Hillsdale school reco rd for fewest points allowed in a game.

¯ Ferguson was impressed with Cornerstone Christian in Saturday’s opener.

“Kwasniak scored 53, but they have a cast of players,” he said. “You could plug any of those players in that spot. They might not average 37, but they would get the job done.”

¯ The last time the Falcons got to the regional semifinals in 2001 they lost to LeBron James and Akron St.-St. Mary, 78-56. That was the week after James and the Irish captured the the Salem Division III district title.

HEARTLAND: 15-15- 6-18–54

HILLSDALE: 20-18-14-21–73

HEARTLAND CHRISTIAN SCORING: Isaiah Matthews 2-0-4, Brody Conaway 4-1-9, Collin Kalaher 9-0-21, Johnny Meyer 0-0-0, Jack Morgan 1-2-4, Corban Seutia 4-2-11, Jacob Reed 1-0-3, Spencer Pruitt 1-0-2, Connor Norbo 0-0-0. TEAM TOTALS: 21-62, 5-7: 54.

HILLSDALE SCORING: Troy Bennett 5-0-11, Hayden McFadden 8-2-18, Lowen Ferguson 1-0-3, Kael Lewis 4-0-8, Bradey Krichbaum 12-2-26, Knox Lewis 3-0-6, Holland Young 0-1-1, Gage Barker 0-0-0, AJ Brown 0-0-0. TEAM TOTALS: 33-71, 5-9: 74.

Three-point goals: Heartland Christian 7-31 (Kalaher 5, Seutia, Reed), Hillsdale 2-11 (Bennett, Ferguson).