Sports
Young Spartans Fall to North Boys
Simley High School players were chilly against North High School Polars in their 48-30 loss Tuesday.
Simley High School, which boasts just two seniors in its starting lineup, continued its boys basketball maturation project Tuesday, dropping a 48-30 contest to visiting North St. Paul in a Classic Suburban conference game.
The North St. Paul Polars, which led from start to finish, snapped a five-game losing streak.
Simley fell to 4-6 on the season and 0-3 in the conference. North improved to 3-6 overall and 1-1 in the league.
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Simley was coming off a pair of rough outings. The Spartans had lost 90-35 at Richfield and 53-18 at Henry Sibley Friday. Tuesday’s game was more of the same as the Spartans struggled offensively, committed too many turnovers and had key defensive lapses.
“We’re a pretty young team, without a lot of varsity experience” said Simley head coach Ben Bushaw.
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“They’re not used to the intensity of varsity basketball yet,” Bushaw added. “We’re developing our offensive game this season. We’re playing underclassmen and the future looks good. It just might not be this season.”
Neither team could find the range in the early going and it was a 2-3 game until North’s Hunter Brooks muscled his way inside to give the Polars a 9-4 edge. Simley’s Christian Goettsch and Shinoby Yang each drilled in three-point goals to give the Spartans their only lead of the night at 10-9 with 8:12 to play in the first half.
And if the Spartans could have kept hitting from the outside, things would have been different. But those two were Simley’s only two three-point baskets of the game.
“We turned over the ball a lot, and we weren’t really shooting great shots,” said junior forward and captain Dillon Kaup, who had 12 points to lead the Spartans.
North reasserted itself and led 21-13 at the half, outscoring the Spartans 12-3 in the final eight minutes of the first half.
Simley never got closer than 10 points in the second half.
Shinoby Yang, one of just two seniors on the roster, added seven points, but no one else for Simley had more than four.
Yang said he thought the Spartans played solid defense and rebounded well. And he thinks he knows what Simley has to be to be more successful.
“Be tougher,” Yang said. “Be physical.”
North took advantage of the Spartans on the interior, which showed in the stats. The Polars went to the line 24 times and made 16 free throws. Simley was just 2-of-4 at the line.
Simley hosts Red Wing Thursday in a contest starting at 7 p.m.
