Elijah Breck goes hard to the basket during the Jays road win against conference rival St. James. Damarius Russel, right, attempts a shot in the paint. Star Eagle photos by Michael Roy
By MICHAEL ROY
Editorial Assistant
The Waseca boys’ basketball team went back into the positive after hosting two close games against Big South Conference rivals this past week.
Waseca 78, St. James 71
Waseca’s first Big South opponent was St. James on Tuesday, January 4.
The Jays jumped ahead to an early 22-8 lead in the first half. Before long, however, St. James caught back up. Waseca held a 46-29 lead at halftime. Head Coach Seth Anderson said he felt satisfied with the team defense’s performance in the first half.
But in the second half, things got scary for the Bluejays. Their defense started to bend against the Saints, giving untimely penalties to allow for plenty of free-throw opportunities. Because of that, St. James outscored Waseca by ten in the latter half.
“We let their best player create easy scoring opportunities as he ended up with 34 points,” Anderson explained. At one point, it was 76-71 Bluejays. Near the end, though, the Saints got too restless and allowed Waseca to seal it with two more points off the free-throw line.
Senior Elijah Breck led the offense with 26 points. Other players that scored include Damarius Russell with 18 points, Isaac Potter with 13, Shaun Hulscher with 11, Jack Schumacher with six, Tyson Reger with six, Parker Link with six, Brandon Pena with two, and Carter McQuery with two.
Waseca 77, Blue Earth 73
If the game against St. James didn’t get the Jay fans’ heart rates up, the match against Blue Earth Area last Friday certainly did.
Both teams left it all on the court, playing stellar offense. However, Waseca was having trouble against their rival.
“We really struggled to start the game,” says Coach Anderson. “We had to dig ourselves out of a 15-30 deficit at the beginning. BEA continued to drive the ball in the paint on us over and over and we either gave up easy scores or else fouled.”
But the Bluejays didn’t falter at all. They flipped Blue Earth’s two-score lead and held on to edge the Blue Earth Bucs 77-73.
Coach Anderson had a lot of praise for how the Jays recovered from their first half performance. “Max Gaytko gave us a great burst off the bench when things got tough and contributed some big baskets,” he said. “Shaun Hulscher made 2 huge free throws down the stretch and Elijah Breck made 2 more clutch free throws to seal the game.”
Senior Elijah Breck was even more unstoppable in this performance than the last, scoring 38 points with ease against the Bucs. “Elijah Breck was an absolute stud in this game,” added Coach Anderson. “He has been playing great basketball these past few weeks.”
Other scorers were Brandon Pena with eight, Damarius Russel with seven, Max Gaytko with six, Carter McQuery for six, Shaun Hulscher with five, Isaac Potter with five, and Tyson Reger with two.
With the two conference wins, Waseca improved their record to 6-5 (3-0) and put themselves in second place within the east division of the Big South Conference. On getting the wins, Coach Anderson says, “Those are both 2 huge conference wins for us. We faced plenty of adversity in both games but the kids kept battling and responding with great team effort.”
The Jays host Fairmont Thursday, January 13 and then travel to St. Clair the following Saturday to face the Cyclones.