02/27/2026
The Raider Boys finished off their regular season hosting Lake Holcombe last night and even though the first half was shakey they would get it together late in the half and come back to take a 28-20 halftime lead. We really struggled early as we didn't get into much offense as we took early shots, tried to drive before moving their defense at all. It just wasn't good overall offense that we needed to run. Our press gave us a little spark as Caleb Wester was able to get a few steals and deflections that led to some easy buckets in transition. Our guys continued to attack the basket mid way through the half, but failed to complete plays until just before half. In the second half Lake Holcombe would kind of shoot like we did in the first half and we did a great job getting into and running our offense and taking advantage of opportunities that their defense gave us. We looked a lot better and we played better because we were running our offenses. When Lake Holcombe tried to press and trap we tended to have an answer for most of what they threw at us. It was a good game to end on and get ourselves ready for tournament play. It will be a difficult game next week against Birchwood who is a team we have not been able to beat in 2 previous games. I hope our guys are ready to get after them and bring our best effort as the previous two games we have played relatively poorly against them. On the night for the Raiders we had pretty good even scoring, which is always nice to see as a coach as you are not relying on only one or two players. We ended up with 4 guys in double figures , which was really nice. Blake Nyhagen and Ryder Rodewald led the Raiders with 13 points and 7 rebounds each. Caleb Wester had his first Double Double of the season going for 12 points and 11 rebounds on the night. Jace Sahlin added 10 points and 9 rebounds. Jace has done a good job these last 2 games in the rebounding department, which is something he will need to continue to do going into tournament play, actually our whole team for that matter. Cole Butterfield went for 7 points and Connor Ptacek added 4, but had 8 rebounds on the night.
The Raiders will host Birchwood next Tuesday March 3 for the First Round of Regional play.