Above: Driving hard to the basket, Breana Peterson knifed between two defenders to score two points. Breanna scored 15 points in an overtime loss to Virginia at the Vikings’ holiday tournament. Right: On offense Leah Utities doesn’t shoot much, but she does a lot of the play making for the Vikings. On defense Leah is a dogged defender. Far right: Only a ninth-grader, Lily Gruber-Schulz is in her second year of playing for the varsity. Lily leads he Viking in rebounding and often is one of the t ams high est scorers.
The Cook County High School girls’ basketball team traveled to Virginia on Thursday, December 27 to play in a holiday tournament.
Up first for the Vikings was host school Virginia Blue Devils. The Vikings got off to a slow start and fell behind early, but fought back to trail by 10 points, 26-16 at the half time.
“We were down at half by 10; got down by as many as 15 in the second half and made a great comeback playing good solid defense,” said Head Coach Todd Toulouse.
Senior guard/forward Theresa Morrin made a lay up with two seconds remaining to tie it at 52, said Toulouse, adding, “The only other time the game was tied was 0-0 at the start of the game. We were down the entire game until she made that lay up. We spent too much energy on our comeback and didn’t have anything left in the tank for overtime.
“I was really proud of them and their attitude for not giving up when we were down by 15.”
The bench-thin Vikings ended up losing the game 64-53, but showed a resiliency and toughness not seen earlier this season.
Leading the Vikings in scoring was senior post player Kaitlynn Linnell with 19 points and Breana Peterson with 15 points.
Besides Linnell and Peterson, the other Vikings who scored were Leah Utities and Lily Gruber-Schulz with 6 points each, and Theresa Morrin, who scored 7 points.
Playing the next day, a tired Viking team faced another large school when they squared off against International Falls.
“The International Falls game was difficult,” said Toulouse.
“I don’t like to make excuses, but the girls were not ready from the get go. We were sluggish and turned the ball over too many times. Turning the ball over so much has become our nemesis. It is hard to win when we turn the ball over 45 times in a game.”
Toulouse said three starters had three fouls within the first few minutes of play and had to sit on the bench for much of the first half.
“We just didn’t move our feet on defense and like I already said we looked slow and sluggish.”
However, said Toulouse, “I was once again proud to see them not giving up in the second half. We did play much better in the second half. Theresa was very solid. She ended up scoring 13 points in the second half and was taking the ball to the rim.”
The Vikings’ top three scorers were Morrin with 15 points, Lily Gruber-Schulz with 6 points and Kaitlynn Linnell who scored 7 points.
Final score in the game was 91-38 in favor of International Falls.
On Thursday, January 3 the Vikings played Southridge at Southridge, and at press time on Friday, January 4, they play Cromwell at home. The game starts at 4:45 p.m.
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