It’s been a bleak week for Cook County High school boys’ and girls’ basketball. All of the games from last Thursday, January 24 through this week were cancelled due to the bitter cold and wild, wicked sometimes snow-filled winds of winter.
The boys’ January 24 home game against Mountain Iron-Buhl (MIB) would have been a dandy. The Vikings were just coming off of a big win against Mesabi East at Mesabi East two days prior, and head coach Colin Everson said he was impressed with the way his team was coming together.
Meanwhile MIB’s record was about the same as the Vikings’.
To date the boys’ record is 8-6, a .571 winning percentage. They are 2-2 in conference play, just ahead of South Ridge and Two Harbors but behind top rated Esko, Moose Lake/ Willow River and Barnum.
Both Viking teams were supposed to travel to Floodwood the next day to face the aptly named Polar Bears. But again, school administrators decided the weather was too dangerous to send kids skedaddling down the highway on a long bumpy bus ride into the cold dark sparsely populated hinterlands more than one hundred thirty miles away from home.
It was a good call.
On the following Tuesday, January 29, the teams were scheduled to travel to Ely to play the Timberwolves but with the entire state school system shut down by the governor’s proclamation to close all public schools for both Tuesday and Wednesday, those games were also cancelled.
When asked if the boys’ and girls’ games against Ely and Floodwood would be made up, Kelly Hawsen, the girls’ head coach, said they would. “We will play Ely away on Tuesday, Feb. 5th at 5 p.m. with just the girls’ varsity. There won’t be any junior varsity games played that day.
“We will be playing Floodwood at home on Saturday, Feb. 16 at 2 p.m. and again, there won’t be any junior varsity games.”
Coach Everson said he was still waiting to hear if the boys’ game with Mountain Iron-Buhl would be made up.
Girls
As for the girls, who don’t have a senior on the team, they have a 5-10 record and are 0-4 in the Polar League (Big) conference, but they are improving week by week.
“Our strengths include our speed when we push transition,” said coach Hawsen. “When we focus on shot selection and limiting turnovers we really come together as a team. It helps when shots fall, we get some fast breaks and momentum builds. All of a sudden we are playing better defense and staying lower in our stance, things start coming together.”
When it comes to making improvement, the coach said, “We need to work on continuing to learn and grow practice to practice, and game to game so we are not repeating the same mistakes over and over. We also have these gaps in scoring, which can last six or more minutes. That goes with shot selection and taking care of the ball. We can’t have those gaps.
“Overall the girls are still really learning who they are as a team and what they want their season to look like. We are working on a lot of fundamental work, including breaking down our defensive stance, passing form and working as a unit on the floor.”
Boys
When asked about his team, first year varsity boys’ coach Colin Everson replied, “We are not able to practice when school is off so that’s a little bit of a bummer to miss a few days of good practice. I think overall as we head into the final stretch before playoffs we have made some strides of progress. In the last few games we have had moments of great flow and continuity on offense and have started to really move the ball better and find our open guys for shots.
“Defensively, we are starting to understand our positioning and help responsibilities. It is has been great to see all of our guys on the varsity, junior varsity and middle school teams all improve and getting better with some fundamentals.
“For a team that is new to some of the things we are running and for not playing [all] together for very long, I think we have made some good strides.
“It will be a big month in February to get a few more pieces put together before playoffs. We still have a lot of areas to improve on across the board, which is the exciting part.
“It has also been great to be working with the K-3rd graders on Saturday. The high school guys have been fantastic to coach and I love seeing the young kids getting excited about basketball. Also, I’ve been able to pop my head in on the fourth- and fifth-graders some and it seems like they are learning lots too, which is great.”
Next home game
Both teams take the floor against North Shore rival Two Harbors Agates on Friday, Feb. 1. The boys play at 4:45 p.m. and the girls’ game starts at 6:30 p.m. Come out and cheer for your Vikings!
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