Photo by Jake McNeill: Marshall guard cooper Mensink drives baseline during a basketball game against Luverne in Marshall on Friday night.

By Jake McNeill

jmcneill@marshallindependent.com

MARSHALL — Cooper Mensink had the hot hand early for the Marshall boys basketball team and the Tigers capitalized from the early shooting boost in an 85-64 win over Luverne on Friday night.

It didn’t take Mensink long to find his rhythm. After Alex Franson scored the game’s opening basket, Mensink hit a layup and a 3-pointer on the Tigers’ next two possessions to start the game off with a 7-0 run just 90 seconds into the game.

Mensink’s second 3-pointer gave him 10 points just two-and-a-half minutes into the game and, after subbing out for a breather, he hit another 3-pointer on each of the Tigers’ first three trips down the floor after he re-entered the game. He scored all of his 19 first-half points in the first eight minutes of the game and finished shooting 7-of-13 from long range with 26 points. It’s the second time this week he’s made seven 3-pointers after shooting 7-of-12 from 3-point range in a double-overtime loss to Hutchinson on Tuesday.

“My teammates were just finding me the ball. The shot was on, but that’s my teammates getting me open,” Mensink said. “If I make a couple, I’ll just keep shooting but if I miss one, I’ll attack or find my teammates and try to get the ball and their hands.”

Marshall head coach Travis Carroll emphasized the importance of ball movement to the team’s offensive success. The Tigers were very efficient with their passing on the night, finishing with 13 assists as a team and just five turnovers. No Marshall player finished with multiple turnovers in the game and Mason Eickhoff dished out a team-high three assists.

“Our team did a good job of sharing the basketball,” Carroll said. “Without help from your teammates, you’re not going to get those types of open looks and it was good to see our team come out and share the basketball on offense and get some good stops on the defensive end.”

On the other side of the turnover battle, Marshall stole the ball 22 times to force 25 Luverne turnovers. Braxton Koster led the defensive charge with six steals in the game while Eickhoff, Franson, Mensink, Jackson Baynard, JR Vierstraete, Braeden Myhre and Drew Parsons each had another two.

Rebounding has been an area of the game in which the Tigers have struggled so far this year. While they technically lost the rebounding battle 32-31, Marshall had a 28% offensive rebounding percentage to Luverne’s 17% and they held an 83% defensive rebounding percentage to Luverne’s 72%. They also grabbed 11 offensive rebounds to Luverne’s four.

“We’ve struggled giving up offensive rebounds to the other team. We have a number that we try to keep teams under and we were able to hit that number, we were able to keep them under that number,” Carroll said. He added that the team also sets benchmarks for turnovers and he was proud of his team for being able to stay under that number in Friday’s win. “It’s good to see when you meet those goals, what type of games you can have from your team.”

Koster led Marshall on the glass with six rebounds on the day, all defensive, while JR Vierstraete grabbed four offensive boards to finish with a total of five rebounds. Mensink also had a pair of offensive and defensive rebounds.

Franson has had a week full of strong scoring performances. After scoring 23 points in Thursday’s win over Pipestone and 33 points in the double-overtime loss to Hutchinson, Franson was the team’s second-leading scorer on Friday with 15 points on 6-of-12 shooting. While his 3-point shot wasn’t falling, he was consistently able to get to the rim and shot 6-of-9 from 2-point range.

Overall, it had been a challenging week of basketball for Marshall heading into Friday. They came up 2 points shy against Hutchinson on Tuesday and beat out Pipestone on Thursday behind a basket from Eickhoff with 90 seconds to play. As such, Friday’s blowout win was a good opportunity for Marshall to test out its depth in a way it hadn’t been able to much of the year. Every Tiger on the roster attempted at least one shot in the game and 11 different players scored at least 2 points.

“We have a lot of competition in our practices and we have some kids who aren’t in the rotation who learn, ‘Oh, he’s getting opportunities in games,’ and it’s nice we were able to get some kids in this game,” Carroll said. “They had some nice moments during this game to continue to show us what they can do and things we can work on, but it’s always a great feeling to get all the kids in the game because all these kids come into practice each day and they all work really hard. It’s always great when you can get them all an opportunity.”

Marshall improves to 7-4 with the win and has now won four of its last five games. The Tigers will get back in action with the hope of securing their third straight win on Tuesday when they host Redwood Valley at 7:15 p.m. The Cardinals are 8-2 on the season and had been on a four-game winning streak before suffering a 60-59 loss to Jackson County Central on Friday night.