Huron basketball team competes against Mitchell
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HURON — After edging the Mitchell Kernels by a point to open the season, the Huron Tiger boys’ basketball team made sure the margin of victory was a bit higher during the second meeting of the season on Saturday at Huron Arena.
The third-ranked Tigers outscored the Kernels 20-7 in the second quarter en route to a 63-52 victory.
“You have to give credit where credit is due. Mitchell is battling,” Huron coach Jon Schouten said. “Those kids play hard and they are battling, coach (Todd) Neuendorf has them going in the right direction.
“We told our kids to don’t think for one second that this is going to be a situation where we are all of a sudden going to blow them out or pull away. That’s not going to happen, not in this league, not in this division,” he said. “Everyone’s coming to play the full 32 minutes every single night, so we have to be able to match that for the 32 minutes.”
The Tigers scored the first six points of the game, but it was the Kernels scoring the final seven points of the opening quarter for a 17-11 lead at the break.
“We got up 6-0 and were all feeling really good, thinking this is going to be like Thursday night where we’re going to jump out big,” Schouten said. “Mitchell answered the bell and smacked us in the mouth. My challenge was to both Evers (Teegan and Tanner), ‘what are you getting done for us tonight’ and they both responded incredibly well for us tonight.”
Nathan Boehrns connected on his lone 3-pointer of the game to kick start a strong run for Huron in the second quarter. Back-to-back baskets by Tanner Evers and a drive and layup by Teegan Evers brought the Tigers back to within a point at 21-20.
Cooper Fryberger, who has replaced an injured Kobe Busch in the starting lineup, regained the advantage for Huron with 3:50 to play in the first half.
The Tigers would outscore Mitchell 8-3 the rest of the quarter to take a 31-24 lead into the half. Teegan Evers fueled the run with a 3-point jumper and a putback and foul, which he converted into a conventional 3-point play. Derick Siemonsman would also record the lone points of the bench for Huron during the run.
“What you are seeing is two kids that have put in an incredible amount of work. They come from a basketball family and their older brother Ty was a really good player for us a couple years ago and they just love the game,” Schouten said of the Evers brothers. “What your seeing is two kids that have put the time in and they are reaping the benefits. We are very, very fortunate to have them two guys on our team.”
The Kernels would narrow their deficit to eight points in the third quarter, but that would be as close as they would get as the Evers brothers continued to pour it on. They combined for 11 of the team’s 15 points in the quarter, which ended with Huron holding a 46-35 lead.
Mitchell, which was still searching for its first win of the season in its sixth game, pulled to within eight with a 3-pointer to start the fourth quarter, but a 6-0 run by the Tigers pushed the lead back to double figures where it would stay for the remainder of the game.