By TYLER HENRY
Salina Post contributor
With a third of their season in the books the Southeast of Saline boys' basketball team, currently ranked #2 in Class 3A, will return to the purple palace to ring in the new year with a league matchup against Minneapolis on Friday night.
Despite facing three ranked teams, including two preseason #1’s, the Trojans have looked dominant thus far, outscoring their first six opponents by 125 points.
“I thought we rebounded really well throughout this first stretch,” SES head coach Bryson Flax said. “For the most part, we stuck to defensive gameplans and executed well, and then we were really successful in transition. I was pleasantly surprised with our efficiency in the half-court and we looked a lot better early than we did last season.”
Despite boasting one of the most stacked resume’s in the state of Kansas and posting a perfect 6-0 record heading into the break, SES was demoted to #2 in the final KBCA rankings of 2022, which bothered many in Gypsum, but far fewer in the Trojan locker room.
“We take rankings with a grain of salt depending on the week,” Flax said. “I don’t think this bothered or lit a fire under anybody, our goals don’t change, we want to be #1 at the end not in January.”
With their focus still intact, the Trojans will turn their attention to another league foe in Minneapolis, who has struggled mightily this season and will limp into this contest at 0-7.
Despite this game coming against the lowly Lions, SES must remain vigilant, especially as they knock off the stagnation of the winter break and settle back into their rhythm.
“We can’t look past an opponent like this,” he said. “They can shoot the ball and they hung with Sacred Heart this week. We’ll have a little rust getting back into a flow and back into game shape but we are who we are and we just need to make sure we’re executing to the best of our abilities.”
While Minneapolis has had a hard time keeping their opponents off the board this season, they have, at times, shown a prowess for putting points on it, dropping as many as 72 in a narrow loss to Ell-Saline earlier this year.
“They have some young talent that can shoot the basketball if they’re open,” Flax said. “Defensively they’re going to try to zone us and that can be a challenge. We tried to simplify our zone offense over the break so we’re not waiting around as much. We’re going to have to guard and prevent them from getting second-chance opportunities.”
Tip-off between the Trojans and Lions is scheduled for 7 pm at Southeast of Saline high school following the girl's game at 6:30.
As always, the game can be heard on KINA (910 AM or 107.5 FM) and streamed with live audio and video on the Salina Post.