Longhorn boys drop games to St. Pat’s, Gering

    The Chase County boys’ basketball team is looking to build some momentum heading into the postseason. While the opportunities are there, the next 10 days will be a challenge.
    “We’re going to play a lot of basketball this week,” Head Coach Chris Bartels said.
    CCS has a lot of chances to improve its record with five games in the next 10 days, including four games in six days.
    But the Longhorns will have to do so with four straight road games against teams with winning records, which started Tuesday this week at Hitchcock County (11-7).
    On Friday the Longhorns will head to Class D1 No. 3 Dundy County Stratton (16-3), then take off for Cambridge (9-9) Saturday.
    Chase County’s make-up game from Dec. 22 with Bridgeport (12-8) will be Monday on the Bulldogs’ home court.
    “All four opponents have winning records and will be good tests for us. Our success this week will depend on how well we rebound and take care of the ball. If we can improve in those areas, I think we will have a pretty good week,” Bartels said.
    The regular season will wrap up with a home game against Sutherland (2-13) Feb. 17.
    The C1-11 subdistrict will be played Feb. 21 and 23.
    Cozad, 16th in the C1 point standings, leads the district followed by No. 19 Gothenburg, No. 22 Holdrege and No. 31 CCS.
    The Longhorns hosted North Platte St. Pat’s, who are No. 1 in Class D1, Friday.
    CCS struggled to contain St. Pat’s Brecken Erickson throughout the night. Chase County only trailed 9-13 at the end of the first quarter, with Tristan Jablonski, Easton Fries and Jensen Olsen leading the way. But Erickson scored 11 of the Irish’s 13 points.
    The trend continued in the second quarter when Ericksen scored 10 points. CCS put 11 on the board, including five by Kade Anderson and four by Olsen.
    The Longhorns had their toughest defensive quarter after halftime, giving up 21 points to the Irish.
    The same core group of players continued to lead Chase County offensively through the second half. Anderson, Jablonski, Fries, Olsen and Camron Lempke scored all 48 points for CCS in the game. Olsen led the Longhorns with 18 points and Jablonski added 14 points.
    Ericksen led all scorers with 33 points in the 48-64 CCS loss.
    Coach Bartels said defensive rebounding was a struggle in the SPVA tournament and again Friday.
    “It seemed like whenever they missed a shot, a St. Pat’s player was there to clean it up,” he said.
    CCS had 13 defensive rebounds in the game and the Irish had 14 offensive rebounds.
    “I thought we did a good job of taking care of the ball and working to get good shots against St. Pat’s, but it’s hard to win games when the opponent is getting multiple opportunities on each possession,” Bartels said.
    CCS played at Class B Gering (10-9) the following night.
    Bartels said the Longhorns knew Gering was going to play more of an uptempo style than they saw the night before with St. Pat’s.
    That didn’t stop Chase County from claiming a 13-10 lead at the end of the first quarter. The Longhorns held Gering to two field goals while getting six points each from Fries and Olsen.
    The script was flipped in the second quarter. CCS only scored two field goals while Gering’s offense kicked into high gear, leaving Chase County trailing 20-35 at halftime.
    Despite the damage done in the second quarter, the Longhorns came out for the second half and stayed competitive with the Bulldogs, but couldn’t overcome eight second half 3s by Gering that made sure CCS didn’t make a comeback.
    Anderson scored 16 points in the second half and finished with 18 points in the 50-72 loss. Olsen scored 12 points and nabbed 13 rebounds.
    Bartels said the Longhorns did a better job rebounding, but struggled handling the ball against the Gering zone, especially in the second quarter.
    “We competed hard on Saturday, but we just didn’t give ourselves enough scoring opportunities to win the game,” he said.