Photo by Jake McNeill Ryan Dalager (15) blows by a Hills-Beaver Creek defender in the Minneota boys basketball team’s 76-68 win over the Patriots in the Holiday Classic tournament at Southwest Minnesota State University on Friday afternoon.

MARSHALL – The Minneota boys basketball team took down Hills-Beaver Creek 76-68 in the Marshall Holiday Classic at Southwest Minnesota State University Friday afternoon.

The Vikings never trailed, leading by as many as 18 points in the game, but they didn’t escape with the win easily. HBC was able to cut into the Minneota lead late, coming as close as 5 points in the final 20 seconds, but was unable to take over.

“We need some consistency on defense,” Minneota head coach Chad Johnston said of HBC’s late comeback effort. “We did some good things defensively at times, and then we had breakdowns. Credit to Hills-Beaver Creek for executing what they wanted to do, but I also felt it was us just not recognizing what they were trying to do. I think we need to be a little bit more consistent on defense, hopefully stay out of foul trouble, that should be a key for us.”

The Vikings’ ball movement gave them ample room for scoring. They played selflessly, never settled for the first look they got, and were able to break down the Patriot defense.

“We’re going to rely heavily on a couple of people scoring, but we’ve got to have people step up,” Johnston said. “The whole concept of the offense is that anybody can score. They’ve got to recognize who’s open and I think we did a really good job of that today.”

Maxwell Rost had 17 points, but his real value was as a distributor. He was consistently able to find open passing lanes even when he wasn’t looking at his target. He finished the game with nine assists and could have had several more had some of his setup passes not bounced off the hands of their receiver.

On the receiving end of those passes, Peyton Sheik and Ryan Dalager were on fire from the field. Sheik had 23 points while shooting 67% from the field and 75% from 3-point range, while Dalager added another 20 on 44-43 splits.

Hills-Beaver Creek also wasn’t settling for bad shots, but its passing wasn’t as accurate as the Vikings’. The Patriots attempted to share the ball, but many of their passes were errant or ill-advised, leading to turnovers and easy transition baskets for Minneota.

At the break, the Vikings led 41-27. Yet, the gap could have been even bigger had the Vikings capitalized on more of their opportunities. A 14-point lead at halftime is significant, but the way Minneota dominated, it could have had the game put away if it had capitalized on more of its opportunities.

Second-chance points weren’t a deciding factor in the game, but they could have been. Both teams struggled on the boards on the night. Boxing out wasn’t as much of an issue as grabbing the ball with two hands and coming down with it. Both teams had chances to either end or extend a possession with a rebound, yet let it bounce off their hands and give the other team an opportunity to recover.

“Our big emphasis is the old-school concept of boxing out,” Johnston said. “There was a lot of standing around and just trying to jump for the ball. We’re not an overly tall team, we can’t afford to do that. We’ve got to get position, we’ve got to keep position and then we’ve got to grab the ball, rip it down and say it’s ours.

Both teams seemed to adjust at halftime and let fewer rebounds get away from them after the break.

The Vikings’ offense didn’t live by the 3-pointer, but they were able to knock it down when necessary. As a team, the Vikings went 6-15 from behind the arc. Their volume and efficiency was enough to open up the interior for their wings to slash to the rim.

After dropping a game against Heron Lake-Okabena/Fulda by 1 point in their season opener and losing 71-39 to Russell-Tyler-Ruthton, the win over HBC was the Vikings’ first of the season.

“We needed to come up with something to get a little confidence,” Johnston said. “We went into this classic thinking that there was a couple games where, if we played good basketball, we could get wins… Hopefully just a confidence booster, seeing the things that we’ve been working on and seeing what happens when we do it well.”

Minneota (1-2) will face off against Murray County Central in day two of the Holiday Classic on Saturday at 10:30 a.m.

Minneota 76, Hills-Beaver Creek 68

MIN 41 35

HBC 27 41

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

SCORING (FG-FGA-PTS): MIN (Sheik 10-15-23; Dalager 7-16-20; Rost 5-17-17)

PASSING (AST-TO): MIN (Rost 9-3; Dalager 3-4)

REBOUNDING (ORB-TRB): MIN (Sheik 3-10; Sawyer DeSmet 5-8; A. Rybinski 1-5)