THE BULL
Marthon basketball goes hand in hand with conference basketball tournament. Saturday’s Southern Nebraska Conference tournament at Centennial High School proved to be perhaps the longest of long tournament days in my tenure with the Clay County News.
I’ve been through several long days of basketball over the course of my newspaper career, but Saturday felt like basketball overload, watching 20 quarters of basketball in one day. All of the games were back-to-back, with Sutton’s girls and boys starting off the day, while in the end, Sandy Creek’s girls and boys battled for SNC team gold in championship games, which according to Sandy Creek coaches, this year’s tournament was the first time that both the Cougar girls and boys appeared in the conference championship games in the same season since 2002!...24 years ago.
Both Sandy Creek teams fell short of team championships, with the girls falling to one of the most complete girls basketball teams I’ve seen in years, the Milford Eagles, while the Cougar boys came one point short of a team championship, falling to Tri County 44-43.
Sutton’s girls were the lone winner of the four Clay County teams Saturday, picking up a highly needed win over Thayer Central with a 54-46 victory to claim third place in the tournament. Sutton’s win avenges a Jan. 16 loss to the Titans when Thayer Central defeated the Fillies 56-51.
Sutton’s boys battled Milford in the third and fourth place game and the Mustangs, plagued by injury and illness Saturday, fell to the Milford Eagles 50-31. Not only did Sutton face the injury and illness bug, but Sutton had to deal with a frontline line-up from Milford that featured a 7-foot center and a 6-7 forward.
One of the games I took in, because the tournament was some 30-45 minutes behind schedule, wasn’t a pair of county teams, so in all, I took in five games, all back-to-back, and when I finally piled into my Jeep to make the trek home, I felt like a man of my age, 61.
And I could tell even more so on Sunday morning when I woke up, having to take a few extra minutes to get out from under the covers, as my body was sore from neck to toe.
I could tell that I had sat much of the day without back support, sitting with crossed legs at times on the floor, or in the “end zone” bleachers at Centennial High.
Despite the marathon day, it was great to see the teams we cover represent each school well, and even though three losses were handed to Sutton’s boys, along with Sandy Creek’s girls and boys, each team made strong pushes to position themselves well as the basketball season pushes closer and closer to the postseason, beginning next week for the girls teams across Nebraska, and in two weeks for the boys teams in the state.
Both Sandy Creek teams positioned themselves well to serve as hosts for Class C-2 sub-district tournaments throughout the SNC tournament. The Sutton girls are in a very tight battle with Tri County to host the D1-2 sub-district tournament.
Just over a tenth of a point separates the Fillies and Trojans as of Sunday, with games for both teams on Tuesday to likely decide which team will host.
Sutton is currently ahead of Tri County so when official pairings are announced this Thursday, hopefully the Fillies will serve as the top seed and host the four-team tournament, which also includes Deshler and EMF.
You’ll also see in the sports section this week that district wrestling takes place across the state this Friday and Saturday.
Sutton heads to Oakland-Craig High School, Sandy Creek travels to Elm Creek, while the Giltner/Harvard boys wrestlers head to Shelby for action.
Last year’s district meet at Shelton made coverage easy for our staff, as all three teams were in the same district. This year we’ll be spread out all over the state for coverage.
Unfortunately for the two girls wrestling teams in the county, Sandy Creek and Giltner/Harvard’s season came to a close last Friday and Saturday, as both teams fell short of having a state meet qualifier, but both teams have another year under their belts to build on for next year.
So while Saturday was a super long day, and those types of days seem longer and longer the older I get, it was still enjoyable to watch teams in the county compete hard, battle hard, and leave it all out on the court.
As I lumbered out to the Jeep, it felt like I had definitely just watched over eight hours of basketball, and my aging body let me know about it Sunday.
Good luck this week to our county boys wrestling teams, and to our basketball teams as they all look down the road at the post-season.
