Wildcats Sweep Double Header over North Branch

Chisago Lakes hosted North Branch on Monday night.

The girls teams for both schools were up first.

Unfortunately, this first game was fairly lopsided. The Wildcats opened up a double digit lead quickly, after the Vikings scored first. CL used their team speed and ball movement to score early and often. Their defense provided plenty of turnovers, this included 15 steals in the 1st half alone. This allowed the Wildcats to get the transition offense working which lead to more scoring. The Vikings stayed strong and were able to get a few tough buckets before the half but trailed 45-8.

The Wildcats continued to play well on both sides of the ball, the defense was able to grab 14 more steals. Their offense was able to slow down and focus more on better execution and running some more unfamiliar plays. The Vikings were able to find more success in the 2nd half and showed a ton of heart. Chisago would win this matchup 73-24.

Scoring

Chisago Lakes:

Claire Beaver 16

Raeann Goehring 12

Annika Smith 11

Madison Eagle 10

Kara Hall and Lucy Asleson 6

Makenna Thorsen and Mariana Cooksley 4

Kayla Larsen and Jayden Pohlman 2

North Branch:

Natalia Rosales 10

Sophia Petersen 6

Alyssa Rediske 3

Carolyn Lombard and Ainslee Hunter 2

Madison Orf 1

Then came the boys game. Their first matchup saw the Wildcats win on the road, so the Vikings were looking for alittle revenge.

Chisago Lakes used their team speed to pull out to an early lead. They controlled much of the pace in the 1st half and the Vikings struggled to get into a rhythm. But as the 1st half wore on, North Branch slowly started to pull momentum their way. Their defense came up big with 3 blocked shots and their offense was able to capitalize. They dropped the deficit from double digits to 6 points. Just as it looked like the Vikings were going to overcome the deficit completely, the Wildcats finished the half strong and grew the lead to 38-26 at half.

For much of the 2nd half, the Wildcats held the lead and had all momentum on their side. As the 2nd half wore along the Vikings morale seemed to get more and more diminished. It seemed like Chisago was well on their way to another win. But the Vikings had other plans. With under 5 minutes to go in the game, the Vikings shifted everything. They proceeded to go on a 15-2 run and with 2 minutes to go were down by only 3 points. The Wildcats called a timeout to try and halt the the Vikings run. This proved to be key, because the Wildcats did enough to drain to final two minutes of clock and hit two free throws to finish off the game with the win 77-72.

Scoring

Chisago Lakes:

Alex Johnson 24

Joe Couwenhoven 16

Cohen Underhill 14

Colton Betts 9

Colton Beaver 6

Luke Leadholm 4

Will Pearson and Logan Senske 2

North Branch:

Ethan Thorsen 29

Vincent DuFeck 16

Jacob Knoespel 15

Andrew Karnes 4

Dhaylen Bachrodt an Sawvkoob Yang 2