February 7
[The JV game against Moorhead. The Spud players looked really young?]
[Just another day at the office.]
[Then the varsity took the floor.]
[The Cards “center jumper,” Robert Anderson, is 6’1″; the Spuds guy was 6’3″, also not their tallest player. Go figure?]
[Basketball superfans John and Ann Heydt look on from afar.]
[Referee signalling a foul against the Cardinals . . . or maybe I’m just being paranoid?]
[Another foul?]
[We handily beat the Spuds in the season opener. They are very young with not a good record. The Cards came out with the appearance of let’s just rack up some points. It seemed whoever had the ball crossing mid-court would take it as far as they could before shooting. I bet we missed our first 10 shots?]
[We eventually settled in to some semblance of team play, and our obvious advantage in experience and athleticism began to take over.]
[Trey Hoepner (1) gathers a rebound.]
[Jared Schneider (13) got extended playing time because of foul issues among the starters.]
[Jaran Roste (1) checks to make sure the cameraman is properly executing the “live streaming.” Have you watched any of the live streamed sports yet?]
[Jake Drew (33), a/k/a, “Charlie Hustle.”]
[At 6’4″, Jake is a big point man at the top of the defense; offensively he positions down low so he can grab every offensive rebound available.]
[Uh-oh, a Spud splits our defense.]
[Jake again as the defensive greeter.]
[Mr. Hoepner with a jumper.]
[And here’s Mr. MVP. Spencer Hockert (15) had another great game with 29 points. He is our leading scorer and will certainly be first team all-conference. The concern is that on nights like this, when the rest of the team is scuttling a bit, there is a real load on him when he ends up with almost half of the team’s total points.]
[Spencer out front. What makes him so tough is he can hit the ‘3’, or drive right by his defender.]
[Coming down or going up?]
[And while his teammates often had adventures on the free throw line, I think he knocked down all of his.]
[At the half, low scoring largely (OK, totally) because the shooting percentages were on the lower side. But you’re always in the game when the defense never rests.]
[Mr. Roste with a little ball movement.]
[Mr. Drew again, and he did knock down his free throws too. That’s good because as an offensive rebounder, he can get to the line a lot.]
[Still waiting for “center jumper,” Mr. Anderson, to pull off a two-handed stuff during a game. Ha!]
[Spencer in mid U-turn.]
[Mr. Anderson got a little banged up on this play and had to come out of the game. Shortly before that, Jaran tweaked an ankle and had to leave the game too. The trend was not good!]
[Then . . . good news. It wasn’t that long before both of them were back at the scorer’s table ready to check back in.]
[Justin Balcome (43) goes for the block – he had a few.]
[And while he’s ordinarily one of our best shooters (he swished a couple of ‘3’s’ during the game), he missed 4 free throws in a row down the stretch. At a time when we really could have put the game away, we missed 6 straight free throws and an uncontested layup. Gives that ‘ugh’ feeling.]
[The final – a nice win.]
Basketball has so much showboating you’d think it was invented by Jerome Kern. ~ Art Spander
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