Broncos basketball finishes summer with MIT

The Falls High Broncos boys’ basketball team competed in its final event of the summer this past weekend at the Pacesetter MIT in St. Cloud.
The tournament format placed 44 teams in four divisions with 11 teams in each division. The tournament was a mix of all four classes in the state of Minnesota. The state currently has four divisions, A, AA, AAA and AAAA. The Broncos currently compete in the AA division. Teams from South Dakota and North Dakota also participated.
Participating in this tournament for the Falls was Chris Heibel, Calvin Phung, Zack Olson, Adam Potter, Timmy Myles, Nate Oustad, Matt Paulbeck, and Ethan Johns.
The Falls received a bye in the first round of the tournament and then played against St. Cloud Apollo (AAAA) who defeated Barnum (A) in the first round. St. Cloud Apollo proved to be too much as they defeated the Falls 79-30.
In game two on Saturday, the Falls had a chance at a rematch with St. Agnes (A) whom the Falls lost to in the tournament in Lakeville last weekend by one point.
The Falls stayed with the Aggies early, but their offense struggled to score and they lost 61-28. In the final game on Saturday, the Falls played against Rockford (AA). This game went back and forth with the Falls trailing by six at halftime. The Falls came out slow in the second half and Rockford scored the first six points to go up by 12 points. After a quick timeout, the Falls battled back but came up short losing 50-42.
On Sunday, teams went into division play based on Saturday's results. This placed four teams in each of the 11 divisions. The Falls played in Division 8 with two Section 7AA teams Esko and Braham and then non-section opponent Mayer Lutheran.
In the first of two games on Sunday, the Falls played Esko. At halftime the Falls led by seven points and midway through the second half the Falls led by as many as nine points.
Unfortunately, the Falls had some defensive breakdowns and turnovers that allowed Esko to crawl back and eventually take over the lead, defeating the Falls 57-49.
In the final game of the day, the Falls took on Mayer Lutheran in the third place game in Division 8. The game went back and forth early with both teams exchanging leads. However, the Falls play toward the end of the half put them down by 20 points.
In the first part of the second half, the Falls didn’t respond to the adversity and were down by as many as 35 points. After a timeout, the Falls came out attacking on offense and responded with a better defensive effort which saw the Falls cut 20 points off of the lead. In the end, the Falls ran out of gas and lost 83-68.
“Despite going 0-5 on the weekend, I felt that we accomplished some things and hopefully learned a lot this weekend both as a team and in our individual play,” Falls head coach Josh Koenig said. “It is never fun to lose, but if you can learn things from situations on the court and are able to apply them to situations off the court, then life lessons can be learned and that is what is the most important overall. “We have played a good variety of teams this summer and have accomplished a lot of what we set out to do over the past two months. We have made great gains in court time, game experience, and getting the kids to compete. Now, the next step in November when the season starts will be to see if they can work together to get over the hump and take that third step to not just be satisfied with competing, but win games that you should win, finish out the close ones, and maybe even upset a team along the way." stated Coach Koenig.
The Falls varsity and junior varsity teams had a busy summer that saw the varsity participate in six out of town events and the junior varsity in three events. Both teams also played at Rainy River Community College on Wednesday nights against Fort Frances. "Overall, it has been very beneficial this summer and the kids have made progress in the right direction," Assistant coach Roger Jerome said. “The players now will have a few weeks off before fall sports start up on August 11.”