March 9th
at Minnesota State University-Mankato
Indians win 59-41
Coach’s Comments (Ryan Hulke):
I don’t know where to start, we were good in so many areas and everyone stepped up to make big plays throughout the game.
St. Clair’s defensive game plan was to take away Madi and Bri, well they went for 25 points on the night so I was happy to see they just didn’t stand around and remained active on the offensive end.
We needed others to step up and score and obviously Madi K took over that roll. Madi started the second half on a 8-0 herself by getting to the basket multiple times and making tough shots. in addition she took over our PG duties most the game and added 6 rebounds and 3 assists.
Mac grabbed multiple defensive boards in a crowd of people and to watch her to go up and snatch those boards from the 6’0 St. Clair girls was awesome. Just to see her fight and the will to grab boards for us was huge. Mac also added a big and 1 in the second half which gave us some life once again.
Sarah Ibarra had a great first half hitting two threes, but unfortunately found herself in foul trouble early in the second half.
Mya also found foul trouble late in the first half and early in the second but obviously when she was in the game she was a difference maker in the paint for us grabbing six boards and contesting St. Clair’s big and their dribble drives all night.
Hanna Himmelman hit a big 3 and a contested layup for us in the first half and once again filled her role off the bench in Hanna like fashion.
Mariah Miller gave us great minutes filling in for Sarah and Mya’s foul trouble just being her scrappy self and was always around the ball and battling on the block defensively. Mariah has given us these minutes all year and is a big part of our success.
So as you can see this was a big time team effort and the best part was our defensive mindset and our ability or want to completely buy-in to our defensive game plan. St. Clair literally has 20 man sets, 10 zone sets and 8 out of bounds plays and these girls put in the time in the film room to know and recognize them all by formation and name. There wasn’t a set called by St. Clair (who doesn’t run a motion offense and will continually run sets) that these girls didn’t know. I couldn’t be more proud of these commitment to get to know St. Clair and everything they do.
Once again we are back in the State Tournament and these girls are not just okay with being there, they want to win games and we should expect to win games.
Madi Heiderschiedt 14 pts, 4 assists
Madi Krueger 14 pts, 9 rebounds
Brianna Polesky 11 pts, 8 rebounds
Sarah ibarra 8 pts, 4 assits and 4 steals
Indians improve to 26-4