Longhorns capture third place at SPVA tourney

    Not only did the Chase County boys’ basketball team add two to its win column, the Longhorns brought home the third place plaque from last week’s SPVA conference tournament.
    CCS, seeded fourth, opened the week with a 52-47 over fifth seeded Hershey.
    Three pointers by Kade Anderson, Keenan Cole and Ryan Bernhardt helped the Longhorns take a 18-15 lead after one quarter.
    Behind Bernhardt’s six points, CCS increased its lead to 28-24 at halftime.
    Anderson carried the load in the third quarter, scoring nine of the Longhorns 16 points.
    Heading into the fourth quarter with a 44-35 lead, CCS had enough in its tank to take a 52-47 win.
    Three Longhorns finished in double figures. Anderson scored 17 points, Cole added 15 points and Bernhardt totaled 10.
    The win moved CCS into the semifinals where it faced top seeded North Platte St. Pat’s Friday at North Platte Community College.
    Cole, Zuege and Anderson scored in the first quarter as the Longhorns fell behind 9-16.
    NPSP took firm control in the middle quarter. The Irish scored 28 points in the second quarter and 25 in the third quarter.
    CCS scored nine points in the second quarter and three pointers by Anderson and Zuege contributed to Chase County’s 14 third quarter points.
    CCS lost the game 37-75.
    The Longhorns were outrebounded 22-44 in the game and gave up 17 second chance points off 20 offensive rebounds.
    Cole led CCS with eight points.
    Bartels said St. Pat’s is a talented and athletic basketball team and they played very well in both of their tournament games.
    “Now we know what to expect when we go play them again in a couple of weeks,” Bartels said.
    In the third place game, CCS gave Perkins County a different look from what the Plainsmen saw when the teams squared off Jan. 13.
    The Longhorns were without Bernhardt and Zuege when they took to the floor in the consolation game.
    “Our strategy definitely had to change a bit without two of our guys. We had a lot of lineups that had never really played together before. Playing Nick (Rau) and Jensen (Olsen) at the same time is something we don’t practice much, but they did a great job of working off of each other,” Bartels said.
    The game was close right from the start. Perkins County took an early three-point lead, but the Longhorns hung around and trailed 8-9 at the end of the first quarter.
    CCS took an early lead in the second quarter on two free throws from Nick Rau. Neither team had more than a three-point lead, the advantage CCS held at halftime, 21-18.
    It looked like the game would slip away from the Longhorns in the third quarter. Despite two three pointers by Tristan Jablonski, CCS was outscored 10-19.
    Trailing 31-37, Chase County found another gear over the game’s final eight minutes.
    With four-straight points, CCS pulled to within two, 35-37, and tied the game at 38 on an Anderson three pointer with 6:20 left in the game.
    After six-more consecutive points by the Longhorns, the game was firmly in Chase County’s favor.
    After free throws down the stretch, CCS came out on top 58-46.
    Anderson scored 11 of his game-high 15 points in the fourth quarter.
    Anderson was joined in double figures by Lempke with 10 points. Jablonski, Olsen and Rau each scored nine points.
    Rau also had seven rebounds and five assists.
    With the teams combining to make 6-46 three pointers there were plenty of rebounds to be had. CCS had 40 rebounds in the game compared to 46 for PCS.
    Bartels said it helped playing PCS last week.
    “We didn’t have to do much of a scout and could just focus on what we needed to do to win the ball game. Coming off of a tough loss, the guys had some extra motivation there too,” he added.
    With players missing throughout the week, Bartels said he’s really proud of how his team battled this week, especially on Saturday when CCS was without Bernhardt and Zuege.
    “Our guys embraced that ‘next man up’ mentality and it was fun to watch them play as hard as they did,” Bartels said. Up next
    The tournament experience should pay off down the road for the Longhorns.
    “Our young guys got some great experience this week and stepped up in some big moments. That gives me confidence in our bench depth as we head into the last month of the season,” Bartels said.
    Now 6-11, CCS hosted Haxtun, Colorado Tuesday and will have another home game Saturday when Hershey comes back to Imperial.