Powder River Examiner -

The Broadus Varsity teams played in two games over the weekend, at home facing St. Labre on Friday, and then traveling to Busby to play Northern Cheyenne Tribal School on Saturday. Here are the game details.

Boys

Broadus Boys Head Coach Mike Richards commented on the St. Labre game, during a Monday interview: “I’m pleased with our effort, but not our sloppiness. If we would’ve cleaned up our play, we would’ve won.”

St. Labre would win the game, 69-66 in an exciting match which see-sawed back and forth, with Broadus coming out to an early lead. St. Labre came back to lead in the second quarter, and Broadus fighting back to go into half time up once again, before losing the lead in the third quarter. Broadus would stay close until the end, with a wild last minute of play which included a Johnny Richards three point shot with 35 seconds on the clock, only to be answered by St. Labre with 22 seconds on the clock, before St. Labre pulled ahead with free throws.

Richards comments came as he looked over the game stats, which included 33 Broadus turnovers, with 31 of St. Labre’s points coming off turnovers. Generally, any team that makes 33 turnovers in a game is going to lose said game, but St. Labre was not without its faults – they had 22 turnovers.

What really hurt Broadus late in the game was missed free throws. Broadus missed four free throws in the fourth quarter, including misses on the front end of 1 and 1s (that is, shots that needed to be made in order to ensure a second free throw attempt). In such a close game, these misses make the difference between a win and a loss.

Richards noted: “The guys put in a good effort, we’ve just gotta clean up our mistakes and start winning those close games.”

Four Broadus players finished the game with double digit points: Johnny Richards with 15, Dillon Gee with 13, Tayden Gee with 14 (including a crowd pleasing dunk), and Marcus Mader with 18 points. Marcus made 8 straight shots from the field to go 8 for 10 on the night.

Broadus would make the trip west on Hwy 212 to Busby on Saturday with a hunger for victory knawing at the players’ insides, and win they did.

“It was all Broadus, all the way,” Richards said of the game.

Broadus came out to an early lead, and kept ahead throughout the game. Richards said that his only worry came when NCTS made 6 straight 3 pointers in the first half, but Broadus was able to adjust their defense to handle the long range attack.

The Hawks led 29-15 after the first quarter, 48-23 at the half, 59-39 after 3, and finished the game up 78-45.

“I was really impressed with Beau Kuhbacher’s bounce back on Saturday,” Richards noted. Kuhbacher had 3 points against St. Labre, and 17 points against NCTS, going 4 for 4 from beyond the arc, and adding 10 rebounds.

Richards also said that Dillon Gee had a great game off the bench, with 16 points and 5 rebounds.

The Boys sit at 2-2 in the conference and 3-4 overall, which makes for 5th place in the conference. Melstone leads the conference at 3-0, followed by Ekalaka and Jordan both at 4-1, and Terry at 2-1.

The Broadus Boys JV lost a close one to St. Labre on Friday, 66-62. It should be noted that St. Labre’s JV team consists of a number of Juniors and other high schoolers, whereas the Broadus JV is mostly 8th graders.

Girls

The Broadus Girls have had a tough go of things this season, with a young team battling it out against older, more experienced teams both inside and outside of the conference. The Lady Hawks had one win under their belts against Plevna, going into last weekend’s games.

Playing against Class B St. Labre on Friday, the Lady Hawks had their work cut out for them. St. Labre came out hot, leading throughout the game to win 76-26.

Zeason Schaffer led the Lady Hawks in scoring, with 6 points.

Bright spots for the Lady Hawks were on defense, where they led in rebounds over St. Labre.

St. Labre had an impressive 35 points off turnovers in the game.

On Saturday, Broadus got down early against NCTS but began to battle back in the second quarter, with the momentum shifting towards the Lady Hawks. Broadus Girls Head Coach Kacey Stanley said that after a long half time due to a ceremony, the momentum seemed to shift more towards Busby, with the final score being NCTS 65, Broadus 41.

Mia Mader led the Lady Hawks in scoring, with 9 points, and 4 rebounds in 9 minutes of playing time, while Oliveah Schaffer had 7 points and 4 rebounds.

“That’s a game we could’ve won,” Stanley commented. She said that Broadus needs to work on its defense in the coming week, with tough games at Ekalaka this Thursday, and against an undefeated Melstone team on Friday.

Here are the game stats:

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