By TYLER HENRY
Salina Post contributor
The Southeast of Saline Trojans basketball team will host the 6-0 Minneapolis Lions on Friday at 7pm.
The Trojans, who enter the new year at 2-4, have an excellent chance to take down a big league opponent and continue the momentum they took into the break with a 37 point blowout of the Beloit Trojans.
With the state moratorium on high school athletics keeping athletes out of the gym until yesterday, Southeast will need to knock the rust off quickly to keep up with Minneapolis.
“It takes a lot of time to get into game shape but it doesn’t take long to get out of it,” SES head coach Bryson Flax said. “That being said I thought practice was good yesterday, we started off a little sluggish but we got back to where we need to be.”
Minneapolis will pose a number of challenges to Southeast, led by senior forward Spencer Davidson, who managed 20 points per game in the 2020 portion of the season.
“They like to get out and run with the basketball,” Flax said. “They have some returning guys that are much improved from a good season last year. They’ll be well coached and ready to go.”
In addition to Davidson, the Lions have found an additional 26 points per game from the combined efforts of Nolan White and Trent Moeckel.
“They have the potential to hurt you from anywhere,” he said. “They pose different challenges than we’ve faced so far and we’re going to have to be prepared for that”
While the Trojans record thus far has been slightly lacking, the improvement of the players has been very good to see over the course of what has been a brutal schedule.
“So far I’ve been really happy with the guys,” Flax said. “Obviously you’d like to win every game but for some teams that’s realistic and for some it’s just not. Our group has been tried and I think that level of competition has allowed us to see where we’re at and what we really need to focus on.”
Tipoff for this game will follow the SES girls game at 6pm from Southeast of Saline High School. As always SES games can be heard on KINA (910 AM/107.5 FM) or streamed on Salina Post.