By TYLER HENRY
Salina Post contributor
The Southeast of Saline boys basketball team will look to secure a share of the NCAA League title tonight as they host the 4-12 Minneapolis Lions.
The Trojans handled Minneapolis in the first contest 55-43 back on January 7th in a lower scoring game than what Southeast is accustomed to.
“It was our first game back from break so it was a little bit ugly and I wasn’t there which was stressful for me but I thought the guys did some really good things,” SES head coach Bryson Flax said. “The offense struggled early but I thought our defense did some really good things.”
The Trojans have been playing their best basketball down the stretch, winning their last six in a row and ten of their last eleven since falling in the semi-final of the Sterling Invitational.
“We still have stretches where we struggle to score,” Flax said. "It’s not that we don’t get shots but we struggle to convert so we’d like to tighten that up but we’re playing pretty good basketball and staying true to who we are.”
The last time these two met, SES held all seven Lions scorers to single-digits but will need another good effort against a versatile team of outside shooters.
“Minneapolis is a tough team to guard because they can give you a different look every night and they shoot a lot of threes,” he said. “I thought we handled those different looks well in the first meeting.”
Like Southeast, the Lions have grown and matured throughout the season as well and will be eager to push for a big-league upset on the road tonight.
“Every team matures to some extent when you get guys comfortable playing a lot of minutes,” Flax said. “They don’t do a lot of things differently than they did early on, they’re still going to zone you and shoot a lot of threes but I think they’re rebounding better than they did early.”
A win tonight would move the Trojans to 8-0 in league play and secure them at least a share of the NCAA crown. One more win after that against either Ellsworth or Republic County would see SES take the title outright for the first time since 2007.
Tip-off between Southeast and Minneapolis is set for 7 pm following the girl’s game at 6.
As always, both games can be heard on KINA (910 AM or 107.5 FM) courtesy of Eagle Radio.