Tad Heitkamp, Head Coach
The Blue Dragons played host to the Flandreau Fliers on January 24th, 2023, in a Big East battle on the hardwood. The game was back and forth the first half as the two teams went into the locker knotted at 22 apiece.
“We came out this evening playing really solid basketball on both ends of the court the opening 16 minutes,” stated Coach Heitkamp. “We were sharing the ball offensively and doing a nice job limiting Flandreau to second-chance scoring opportunities.”
The Blue Dragons came out of the locker after halftime and stumbled a little on the defensive end of the court, but the game never got out of reach as the home team was knocking down shots of their own.
“We came out lethargic defensively to open the 2nd half,” indicated Heitkamp. “We were not hustling back on defense, we failed to communicate, and we didn’t get those 50/50 balls when given an opportunity. The upside of that entire situation…we were scoring some points to keep us in the game.”
The Blue Dragons locked things down defensively as they held the Fliers to 3 points in the final 8 minutes, but couldn’t get one more bucket to fall as Flandreau defeated the Blue Dragons 41-42.
“We had 3 or 4 opportunities to come out on top the final couple of minutes, but we just couldn’t get the ball into the basket,” mentioned Heitkamp. “This is the 4th or 5th game this season that we were there at the end, but just couldn’t bring home the victory!!!”
Senior guard Sam Schleuter had a solid night hitting for 12 points, while grabbing 9 rebounds and handed out 4 assists. Ian Buettner (3 assists) and Blaine Trower dropped in 10 and 8 points each, as Ramsey Schweitzer (7 rebounds) added 4 points of his own. Brecken Weir (2 steals) collected 3 points, while Dylan Jessen and Matthew Gilbert contributed 2 points each.
The team stayed on the home court and took on Dell Rapids St. Mary's on Monday, and were still unable to break their streak this season, losing 32-69 to the Cardinals. On Tuesday, they faced Baltic in the Dragons' Lair (results not available at press time), and on Friday, they'll head to Montrose to face off with McCook Central/Montrose. Their next home game will be against Sioux Valley on February 16.
