BROOKINGS The Huron basketball teams each pulled away from Brookings in the second half during a doubleheader at Bob Jostad Gymnasium on Tuesday night.
The Bobcat girls fell to the Tigers 49-38 and the boys lost 52-38. The Brookings girls fell to 4-4 on the season, while the boys dropped to 0-8. Each team will head to Rapid City this weekend. The two teams will play Rapid City Central on Friday and Rapid City Stevens on Saturday.
Between the two games there was a dedication ceremony for the naming of the press box at Bob Jostad Gymnasium. The press box was named Dellas DC Cole Pressbox after the late Dellas Cole, who was the radio voice of the Bobcats for many years. Cole passed away in 2022.
Girls
Huron 49, Brookings 38
The Bobcat girls led early in the second quarter but the Tigers would take a lead into halftime and then pulled away in the third quarter.
Brookings trailed 10-9 one minute into the second quarter but then went on a 10-0 run to go up 19-10 with 4:28 to play in the first half. Huron then outscored the Bobcats 13-1 the rest of the half and took a 22-20 lead into halftime.
Huron then stretched its lead to 35-27 by the end of the third quarter. The Bobcats cut the lead to 38-32 with 5:24 left but the Tigers then went on a 7-1 run to put the game away.
Brookings head coach Mitch McLagan said he thought his team started to not take care of the ball in the second half. Brookings finished with 22 turnovers and also shot 35.1% from the field.
We executed really well, especially in the first quarter. We got into a little bit of foul trouble in the second quarter and then had to do some subbing. We kind of lost rhythm. Huron did a good job of speeding us up and then our girls, thats when we didnt execute. We either went and turned it over or had a bad look or forced up a shot early. It felt like we had too many turnovers that were unforced and they didnt have to get, McLagan said.
The Bobcats were 4-of-21 from three. Brookings was led by Logan Smidt who had 13 points. Sloan McLagan had 10 points and Macy Even had six points and five rebounds.
The Tigers shot 37.2% from the field and were 3-of-10 from three. Hylton Heinz had 23 points and eight rebounds to lead Huron. Allison Janes had 12 points and six rebounds.
The Tigers had a 31-24 in rebounds and had 11 second chance points. McLagan said he thought his team ran out of gas in the second half.
Early [defensively] I thought we were good and then I think we got fatigued. We werent really good mentally tonight. We lost assignments and thats where we dont execute very well. We have to do a better job when were physically fatigued of staying in the moment, and I thought we struggled with that tonight, McLagan said.
The Bobcats have now lost four-straight games after winning their first four games of the season. McLagan said his team needs a bit of a reset and thinks a trip out west this weekend could provide that.
We played two teams that were really good [in the first two games of this losing streak] and then we played two games where it was kind of a coin flip where whichever team showed up and played better is going to come out with the win. The thing we hang our hat on is rebounding and they killed us on the glass tonight. We have to get back to the basics and do our thing. We still have a really good basketball team in that locker room. Were struggling right now, but itll be nice because we have a few days of practice here and then we head out west and sometimes that trip out west can be very valuable, McLagan said.
Boys
Huron 52, Brookings 38
The Bobcats hung around for three quarters with the Tigers but turnovers and fastbreak points proved to be too much.
It was 26-26 at the midway point of the third quarter and Huron outscored Brookings 10-5 the rest of the quarter. The Tigers then went on an 11-3 run to open the final frame and that put the game away.
Broookings had 20 turnovers that led to 21 points off turnovers. The Tigers also had 22 fast break points. Brookings head coach Mike McCarty said that was the biggest difference in the game. We just werent able to make the shot at the end and they unfortunately had some easy run outs at the end, McCarty said.
[We lost because of] a few of the turnovers and then they got some runouts on some long missed shots. It was 22-0 in fast break points and that was a huge difference in the game.
He added that the length and physicality of the Tigers made things hard for the Bobcats.
Size and physicality. They really got after us in the second half, being physical. We didnt handle it the way that we needed to. We need to do a better job when teams get physical like that, being able to handle it and get the ball to where we can be successful, McCarty said.
The Tigers led 13-9 at the end of the first quarter. The Bobcats then outscored them 10-8 in the second quarter and trailed 21-19 at the end of the second quarter. Brookings then stuck with Huron in the third but the Tigers won the third 15-12.
Brookings shot 28.6% from the field and was 2-of-15 from three. Brodie McCarty, Jones Huntimer and Bergan Tetzlaff each had nine points. Tetzlaff also grabbed six rebounds. Jase Bauer had eight points and five boards. Jonathan Kahler had six points and six rebounds.
Huron shot 42.9% from the field and was 2-of-13 from three. The Tigers were led by Blake Ellwein who had 21 points. The 6-foot-9 junior has scholarship offers from both South Dakota State and South Dakota. McCarty said
Hes a very talented player. I dont know what he had, four dunks tonight. Hes one of the best players in the state and we had trouble matching up with him. I thought [Tetzlaff] did a pretty good job on him for the most part but he got two or three run outs and got some easy dunks and that really got him going. Once he has it going, a player like that, its hard to keep him down, McCarty said.
Jonathan Peteson had 11 points and five rebounds for the Tigers. Trace Wentz had eight points.
Brookings won the rebound battle 36-29. Despite the loss, McCarty was happy with how his team defended and rebounded on Tuesday night.
I think we did a lot of positive things in the game. We out-rebounded them 36-29. We had 10 offensive rebounds and that was our high for offensive rebounds on the season. I was proud of the way we competed on the defensive end. This was the season low for points allowed and if we can keep games in the low to mid 50s, I think we have a chance to win some of these games, McCarty said.
Rebounding and defense were the positives on Tuesday night and McCarty said right now his team needs to focus on those positives and hopefully those will result in some victories.
Obviously we would like to get a win, but that hasn’t happened for us yet this year. We have to focus on things that were doing well and try to get progressing and hopefully we can put a full four quarters together soon and start winning some of these, McCarty said.
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