Charlie Hanson, Alex Asmus lead scoring vs. EV-W

Here's the lowdown on Tiger boys basketball at the start of this week. Season won-lost: 20-9. In section: 8-4. Conference: 9-5. Away: 8-4. Neutral: 5-0. Home: 7-5. The next game: it's this Thursday, March 14, against Jackson County Central, the Huskies. The location is Southwest State University, Marshall. Game-time is 8 p.m. Tournament games to date: 

- win vs. New London-Spicer 70-58

- win vs. Montevideo 65-63

- win vs. Eden Valley-Watkins 57-53.

The Tigers started out the tournament seeded No. 4. Monte was the No. 1 seed, EV-W No. 2. 

 

Huskies come on strong

Let's take a closer look at the JCC Huskies from southern Minnesota. Won-lost: 20-7. Section: 12-3. Conference: 12-5. Away: 8-2. Neutral 4-1. Home: 8-4. Tournament games to date:

- win vs. St. James Area 90-45

- win vs. Pipestone Area 94-80

- win vs. Redwood Valley 59-46 

 

Focus on the Tigers

Was so glad Sunday night to discover that our MACA coaching staff submitted some individual game stats for the "Maxpreps" site. I had been unable to find these anywhere else. Amazing how the media can just "shut down" just because it's the weekend. Very disappointing. Through my newspaper career in Morris I was up for writing on Saturday and even Sunday. So I was never active in church. 

I would have been active in First Lutheran. First Lutheran is showing signs of possibly being in its death throes now. It has gotten that bad. We have a rotating system of fill-in ministers from other local churches. On Sunday it was the Federated Church guy. But Federated Church reflects the Methodists and isn't the Methodist Church split on gay rights? So there's one faction that is receptive and another against? 

Actually Federated is a hybrid with the Methodists and UCC (United Church of Christ). I'm not going to try to figure all this out. But First Lutheran is ELCA in theory and it seems not too much to ask to have a proper minister simply show up. And if that can't happen, maybe we should just lock the doors. Skip taking all the trouble. Cyrus can handle this but First Luth. in Morris cannot? I thought we were the "big town." Morris has dropped the ball with many things through the years.

 

Tigers 57, Eden Valley-Watkins 53

It isn't that easy to navigate "Maxpreps." I do have some experience. Mark Torgerson was good with cooperating on this website. The new coaching regime is inconsistent. I wish they'd follow Mark's example. I am happy to report individual highlights here on "Morris of Course." 

Charlie Hanson and Alex Asmus co-led our scoring, each with 16 points. Hanson made 7 of 14 shots, Asmus 6 of 10. We had one other double figures scorer: Riley Asmus with 13 points on 5 of 8 shooting. Four other Tigers contributed points: Drew Huebner 5, Jack Kehoe 3, Owen Anderson 2 and Tyler Friesen 2. 

Our team shooting numbers were 23 of 48, 48 percent. Alex Asmus made all three of our 3-pointers. He was three-for-five. As a team we were cool at three of eleven, 27 percent. In freethrows we were 8 of 14 with Riley Asmus our top performer at 3 of 4. 

Our team is young! Alex is a freshman, Riley a sophomore. Kehoe too represents the sophomore class. I remember a time in MAHS school history when sophomores were forced to play 'B' team. That arrangement was bad for the varsity performance and especially bad in terms of the development of the players. A person could complain but it didn't do any good.

 

The image from "X" formerly Twitter shows Riley Asmus (left) and Drew Huebner who were all-tournament for the December Fergus Falls holiday tournament. Heidi Asmus reported this for "X".

 
Rebounding versus EV-W had Riley Asmus topping the list with six. Huebner, Hanson and Alex Asmus each had three. Our team total was 24 of which five were offensive. Huebner had two assists and Riley Asmus one. Hanson stole the ball twice. Friesen picked up the one blocked shot. The Tigers had eleven turnovers. 

This is interesting: The Maxpreps site has a game review article generated by "InfoSentience." The article is based on data entered on "Maxpreps." Cool, in our technological age. Could not have dreamt of this when I was young. So here's their review:

 

Two teams were on the hunt for playoff glory, but only the Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta Tigers walked away with it. They snuck past the Eagles with a 57-53 victory on Saturday. Winning may never get old, but Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta sure is getting used to it with their third in a row.

Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta's success was the result of a balanced attack that saw several players step up, but Alex Asmus led the charge by scoring 16 points. Another player making a difference was Charlie Hanson, who scored 16 points along with two steals.

Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta is on a roll lately: they've won six of their last seven contests, which provided a nice bump to their 20-9 record this season. As for Eden Valley-Watkins, their defeat dropped their record down to 24-5.

Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta's road trip will continue as they head out to face Jackson County Central at 8:00 p.m. on March 14th. Morris Area/Chokio-Alberta has been dominant on offense recently, as they've racked up an incredible 790 points over their last 11 games. Eden Valley-Watkins does not have any more games scheduled as of now.

   

So does this pass muster? Progress marches on.

Basketball and music

The blog post I wrote yesterday for "I Love Morris" lamented how the MAHS spring band trip conflicts with basketball. The music group will depart on Thursday, same day as the Tigers play next. So I'm quite concerned and sad about that. My own personal $ donation might have made the band trip possible. 

No pep band Thursday unless other arrangements can be made. Could Hancock help out? Hancock has a noteworthy pep band. 

MAHS band has a concert on the day I am posting this, which is Monday. I was thinking of attending the concert but now I'm a little down because of the circumstances I cover here. Here's an email I sent to a friend this morning:

I'm not sure I feel like attending band concert tonight. It might be my fault that there will be no pep band at SSU this Thursday. My $ might have been essential for the trip. I suppose you'll pounce on me now and say it wasn't, but I think it was. I always find a way to screw up in this town. And I feel bad that the basketball kids who are in band won't be able to go. I really do. It's terrible that school planning is affected so badly by never knowing how far a team is going to progress. Everyone has to get out of the way and make room. The Tigers could have lost their very first game to New London-Spicer. But no, now they're playing their fourth game. And I suppose they could win that. Then we're looking at trips to the Twin Cities. Sports is a monster that devours everything in its path. 

So I don't think I'll be at concert tonight. I'm getting old and need to slow down anyway. I don't like leaving the house after dark.

First Lutheran Church

I checked YouTube and looked like very few attending church. It is possible there will be continual drop-off because people will feel discouraged. If I wanted to hear Orendorf I'd go to Federated. And I don't know if he's a pro-gay or anti-gay Methodist because the Methodists are split on this. I'm not wild about gay rights and I don't want to hear a lot of talk about it, but I accept it.

Going back a couple months, there was no excuse for coffee hour to be canceled. This is the best example for how our church is dying. Something odd has been happening there.

Sounds like our rotating pastors will be Orendorf, Emmy and Chris Richards. Why is the Cyrus church so settled and solid with Chris having been there so long, and we at FLC are totally screwed? Dan held us back because he was a political liberal and very pro-Palestinian. I think we should just avoid the Middle East subject, it isn't necessary. Meanwhile I think Chris is just doing a good mainstream professional job in Cyrus. How did we let Cyrus gain this advantage over us? Cyrus is a wide spot in the road.

- BW