The Cardinals boys basketball team knew they were in for a fight against a Wamego team bigger than they are.
Senior Micah Barron understood this as he competed for loose balls and ripped rebounds away throughout the game to match Wamego’s physicality and toughness.
“Every team is bigger than us, so we have to be physical every game,” Barron said. “This is normal for us.”
Barron’s and the Cardinals’ intensity helped the team earn a 46-33 win Friday night and improve their record to 12-3 on the season.
Since Wamego is a bigger team, it was important for the Cardinals to limit Wamego’s chances in the paint, junior Logan Sullivan said.
“Our game plan was to not let them catch it in the post and make them shoot outside,” Sullivan said. “They’re big, so you can’t let them shoot inside. We just didn’t let them score in the paint. I think they could’ve scored more in the paint, honestly, but we did a good job deflecting and getting around screens.”
Head coach Kyle Deterding said the tone on defense was set early in the game by senior Cole Parker when Parker forced a couple of turnovers using his toughness.
“He’s not that big of a dude, but had two steals working on their post man early,” Deterding said. “Which was huge because we don’t have that many big guys.”
As for the offensive side of the ball, Sullivan led the way in scoring with 26 points and hit five 3-pointers on the night.
Sullivan said he felt like he started the game out missing shots, but got hot when he got his teammates involved. Sullivan scored eight straight points to end the first quarter and start the second.
“Once I got my teammates involved, shots started falling for me,” he said. “Everybody will get opportunities, too.”
Parker contributed to the scoring as well by putting up seven points and hitting two 3-pointers.
Senior Conor Dunback also put up seven points of his own and hit a basket while drawing a foul that put the game out of reach for Wamego.
While he was happy to get the win, Deterding said he felt the team only did enough to win and the team needs to clean up some things moving forward.
“We competed well,” Deterding said. “We didn’t play the cleanest, but we competed enough to make enough shots and get enough stops to get it done.”
Much like the boys team, the girls basketball team knew they were going to be playing a tough opponent.
Junior Kenzie Yoder said she felt like Wamego would be looking for revenge after the Cardinals knocked them out of the playoffs last season.
“We knew they were going to come out, after state last year, and we knew they were going to give us a good fight,” Yoder said. “So, we tried to come out hard.”
The Cardinals got off to a strong start and only trailed by eight at halftime, 27-19.
But after the break, the Cardinals came out flat and were outscored 35-10 in the second half. The final score was 62-29 and the Cardinals’ record fell to 6-9.
Junior Jayla Erpelding said fatigue might have played a role in the team’s second-half struggles.
“I was really proud of us at halftime,” Erpelding said. “I think, honestly, after halftime we had problems just getting tired and just let go.”
Once the bleeding started for the Cardinals in the second half, it was hard to stop it. Yoder said the second half struggles were not so much what the Cardinals were doing wrong, but more of what Wamego was doing right.
“They got on, they got really hot,” Yoder said about the second half. “We had a hand in their face, but if they’re on, they’re on, and they were on tonight.”
A major problem that plagued the Cardinals throughout the game Friday night was turnovers. Even though the team started strong, the turnovers prevented them from gaining enough momentum to take the lead or mount a comeback.
“We have to be more confident and strong with the ball,” Yoder said. “We struggle a little bit with confidence and so that’s going to be key in practice is pushing each other harder in practice so that we are ready and confident for games.”
Head coach Brandon Parker thinks the team actually took a step forward in their ball handling and thinks that is something they can build on.
“The more we get people comfortable in dribbling and being a resource, the more confident we will become as a team,” Parker said. “So, there are pieces to this game we can pull from and build off of. We’re going to keep working and building. I still think this group’s got much more of a ceiling to go. We’re going to keep encouraging them to believe in themselves and reach it.”
Both teams will face Ottawa next week, a team both squads already have experience playing against.
Deterding said Ottawa is another team bigger than the Cardinals, so he expects another physical game.
“We just played them a week ago and it was a kind of a back-and-forth, ugly, physical game,” Deterding said. “So, I’m sure it’ll be the same thing again.”
The boys team defeated Ottawa 46-42 the last time the teams played.
The girls, however, lost to Ottawa 46-42. Parker said cleaning up the team’s turnovers will be key to the game.
The girls game against Ottawa starts at 6 p.m. and the boys game starts at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday.
Reach reporter Jack Denebeim at [email protected].
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