June 10, 2021 at 1:12 p.m.
Eagles break through with back-to-back wins
Out of the locker room, the Eagles offense could not find that groove and sputtered against a tough Bigfork defense. Slowly the Huskies pulled away and had leads of 54-39 with 13:11 left, 64-41 with 9:49 to go in the game and their largest lead with just over 5:00 left in the game at 76-43. The final ended with the Eagles closing the gap slightly to 84-54.
Rebounding and very good post play by the Huskies proved too much for the Eagles on this night.
Justin Wicks led the team in scoring with 18, while Freshmen Cooper Kovall added 10 and Zach Greene chipped in 9.
Eagle Scoring- Greene-9, Likens-5, F Smith-2, Wake-5, Nornberg-5, Wicks-18, Kovall-10
Eagles- 34 20 54
Bigfork- 43 41 84
Next up for the Eagles was the Bug-O-Nay-Ge-Shig School Silver Eagles on Tuesday, January 14.
The game was a close contest through much of the first half as both teams struggled to score. Northland led by only one (10-9) after the games first seven minutes. A quick 9 point run over the next two minutes put the home squad up by 10 and never looked back as they pushed the lead to 14 at half 35-21.
The defense picked it up to start the second half as the Eagles rolled to their largest lead of the night 70-38 midway through the second half. The bench played a lot of minutes in this one and held their own down the stretch to the final score of Northland 78 - Silver Eagles 51.
The win was the first of the season for the boys (1-9) and first of career for Head Coach Chris Carlson. Encouraged by the win but still not playing as well as they want yet for an entire game, Carlson said "We struggled with spacing against the zone, but we did play a bit stronger on defense to start the second half."
Leading the team in scoring in the game was Senior Zak Nornberg with 22 points, he also added 11 rebounds, 6 assists, and 6 steals. Fellow Seniors Easton Wake with 18 points and Austin Likens putting in 10. Wake and Wicks each recorded 12 boards to lead the team.
Eagle Scoring- Greene-4, Likens-10, Wake-18, Nornberg-22, Swankier-2, Wicks-10, Kovall-7, Stefan-5.
Northland- 35 43 78
Silver Eagles 21 30 51
Fresh off their win on Tuesday, the Eagles played host to the Cromwell Cardinals, Thursday January 16. The game was close all the way with neither team ever able to get ahead by more than eight points.
Cromwell started the game with a slim lead, but was unable to hold it much past the opening few minutes as the Eagles fought their way back to claim the lead of this early defensive struggle, 12-10 at the 10:35 mark. Over the rest of the first half the teams would basically trade baskets as the Eagles kept the lead and went into half-time with a 32-28 lead.
As closely as the first half was, the second half was even more of a nail biter. The Eagles held onto their lead but the Cardinals kept coming at them and closed to within one, 47-46, with 6:31 remaining in the game. With just over 3:00 to go the Cardinals finally took the lead back at 51-49. The lead was short-lived as the home team quickly answered with a quick bucket to tie the game and over the next two minutes would increase their lead to 58-54 with just 34.9 seconds to play. With the Cardinals forced to foul, three free throws by Junior Gary Gross would seal the hard earned 61-56 victory.
Gross would lead a balanced attack with 17 points, while five teammates would chip in with seven or more points each. Justin Wicks would lead the way with 12 rebounds while Gross had a team high 4 assists and Nornberg grabbed 3 steals.
"We have been emphasizing team play, and for much of the game we did that." Said Coach Carlson.
Eagle Scoring- Likens- 9, Wake-7, Nornberg-7, Gross-17, Wicks-8, Perkins-4, Kovall-9
Eagles- 32 29 61
Cromwell- 28 28 56
Saturday, January 18, the Eagles hosted the Onamia Panthers. The Panthers were on a 3 game winning streak while the Eagles had notched 2 wins in a row.
Once again the Eagles struggled early on offense as they could only muster 2 points over the games first seven minutes and were down 12-2. The Eagles did pick up the scoring slowly but the Panthers kept the lead anywhere from 7-11 points and led at half 30-21.
The second half started with both teams struggling to score. With 11:20 to go in the game, each team had only put up five points in the half as the Panthers still had a 9 point lead at 35-26. The Eagles tightened up the defense and chipped away at the Onamia lead, closing to within five at 46-41 with 5:13 remaining. The Eagles used a 10-5 run over the next 3:25 to finally tie the game at 51-51, with 1:48 showing on the clock. A three pointer by Panthers would put them up 54-51 with just under a minute to play. Three free throws by the Eagles would knot the score at 54 with 26.7 seconds left and the Eagles with the ball. As time ran out a shot hit the front of the iron for the Eagles and the game went to over-time.
Onamia stepped up their defense in OT as the Eagles could only muster 4 points and would fall 62-58 in a thriller of a game.
Gary Gross once again paced a balanced attack with 14 points, with Wicks adding 12 and Likens 9. Nornberg led with 8 rebounds, while Likens grabbed 4 steals to lead in that category.
Understandably disappointed with the loss, the Eagles did play possibly their best game of the year. A season low 11 turnovers, their rebounding was solid against a taller Panther squad, team defense was much more successful in the second half. Taking the positives from this game heading into games at McGregor on Tuesday, Jan. 21 and at Greenway of Coleraine on Friday, Jan 24, the boys should have gained some valuable confidence and expectations of how they need to and can play.
Eagles Scoring- Likens-9, Wake-5, Nornberg-8, Gross-14, Wicks-12, Perkins-5, Stefan-5
Eagles- 21 33 4 58
Onamia- 30 24 8 62[[In-content Ad]]
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