By TYLER HENRY
Salina Post contributor
The Ell-Saline boys basketball team will open their season with an area rivalry game as they welcome the Sacred Heart Knights to Brookeville.
The Knights won in dominant fashion last year, rocking the Cardinals 79-21 to open their season.
While Ell-Saline has improved greatly since then, the program is still in the midst of a rebuild. The team will enter this season still in search of their first win since January of 2019.
Sacred Heart on the other hand is coming off of a 15-4 season but will have a number of questions to sort out after graduating 70% of their scoring with a big senior class.
While the two have met in the regular season just once in the last five years, the Knights have eliminated the Cardinals in the playoffs three times in that stretch, and the proximity of the schools always keeps things interesting.
"It always means a little more when you are playing a school so close to you,” Cardinals head coach Marty Wendel said. “Most of our students come from Salina and know students that go to Sacred Heart so it allows for a little smack talk within those groups.”
While Coach Wendel is in just his second season at the helm for Ell-Saline, he has already grown to respect what the perennial powerhouse has become over the years.
“Coach Gormley has a tremendous program and Sacred Heart has always had a rich tradition in basketball,” he said. “We know they are going to be very disciplined and a team that isn't going to beat themselves.”
Sacred Heart will enter this game as heavy favorites even with all the uncertainty around scoring, but the Cardinals are hungry for a win and are prepared to give the Knights a run on Friday night.
"In order for us to come out with a W on Friday we are going to have to take care of the basketball, be patient and work to get quality shots every possession,” Wendel said. “We have to be very active on the offensive glass, take care of the defensive glass, get them slowed down in transition, and execute late on both ends of the floor.”
Tip-off between the Cardinals and Knights is set for 7 pm at Ell-Saline high school following the girl's game at 6.
For more on both teams in 2021-22, stay tuned to the Salina Post.