Holy Angels wins defensive battle

Troy Bell Jersey

Prologue
I take a 1 day break from my tour of St. Paul as I venture to Holy Angels to see them take on Shakopee in a Missota conference matchup.  Rare that I pass on pizza at Holy Angels but when I saw them take on Duluth East 3 weeks ago it was a bit greasy so I went with a respectable hot dog.  Interesting that the Shakopee Area Catholic Schools kids performed the national anthem and had a 6th-8th grade group do a big dance routine at the half.  That included the longest single kick line I think I've seen.  So long that they had to wrap it around on 1 end.  Then you had me there to see Shakopee but decked out in a Academy of Holy Angels Stars T-Shirt.  A strange day to say the least so that gives me an opportunity to pull out this classic.

Song of the Day
Oingo Boingo - Weird Science

Game Time
We can skip the 1st 7 minutes as the offense is non-existant and ugly.  Sam Keis for 3 for a 6-2 Holy Angels lead and it feels like an offensive outburst.  Timeout AHA at 10:50 and I'd call it a MoKiller timeout but what momentum.  Shakopee's star soph wing/post Tyler Weiss with the layup on the high-low feed and a jumper at the 9:15 mark.  That's the 1st 6 for the Sabers.  6'1 lefty forward Sam Oldsberg off the Sabers bench with back to back putbacks.  Those end an 11-2 Shakopee run over 3:55.  13-10 Sabers at the 6:55 mark.  Danny Sullivan scores a putback off a turnover to put AHA back on top 14-13 at the 3:30 mark.  That's his only bucket of the night.  Kies with a pair of buckets countered by 2 freebies and another putback by Oldsberg.  20-19 Holy Angels with the lead at the half.

Frosh point guard Evan Hagan with a runner for Shakopee to give them a 25-24 lead with 13:35 to play.  Then Jordan Dembley converts a turnover for a layup and nails a left wing step back jumper before converting another turnover into 1 of 2 free throws.  30-25 Stars at the 9:16 mark and the rest for Weiss is over.  Keis adds 2 free throws at the 8:30 mark to conclude an 8-0 Holy Angels over 4+.  32-25 Stars lead.  Weiss gets a post touch on an X look (we'll show it below) and scores.  Only 1 field goal in a 6 minute stretch for the Sabers.  Keis to the rim for a layup to push the lead to 37-28 with 6:55 left.  Brentan Carkuff inside and converts the 3 point play thru 3 Stars.  39-34 Holy Angels with 4:37 left.  That's the last field goal of the night for the Sabers.  The Stars spread with Dembley controlling.  He converts a putback and then scores on a post up with 3:10 left to push the lead to 8.  Holy Angels wins 46-35.

Post Game
An ugly game to say the least.  Tyler Weiss leads Shakopee with 12 points on 6-12 FGs.  Shot looks a little funky but its effective and he can play inside or out.  The Sabers have 0 seniors on this year's roster which means not only do they have everybody back next year, but both bigs (Weiss and 6'8" or so Jake Maiers) are back.  Starting point guard Evan Hagen is only a freshman.  Shakopee falls to 4-7 in the Missota and 8-15 overall.  They've now lost 5 out of 6.  They have a couple of winnable games against Red Wing and at Northfield before closing out the regular season at home against league leader Chanhassen.  They're probably looking at the 5 or 6 seed in section 2AAAA.  They have a win over Waconia in their favor where Kennedy beat Cooper and Jefferson has now lost 12 of 13 and still has to play at Apple Valley and host Eastview.

For Holy Angels, Sam Kies leads with 13 and they win despite only 3 points from star forward Danny Sullivan.  He's playing more outside now with the emergence of sophomore center Charlie Koontz.  The Stars have now won 4 out of 5 to improve to 12-8 (6-4) and look out as you appear to have another Larry McKenzie team peaking as they get to March.  The section is absolutely insane with 19-3 Blake having a win over DeLaSalle and still only the 6th best QRF in the section.  Holy Angels can really help themselves in the race for a 1st round home game as they have Chaska and New Prague at home and the annual rivalry game at Richfield (Blake also has that game).  Win all of those and the case for #3 is great.  But right now its hard to argue against Chaska right now for that 3 seed with head-head wins over AHA (and higher league finish right now) and Blake.  Plenty to still be determined in those 3-6 spots in that section.

Play of the Day
Not original by any means as Chaska ran this a ton for Spencer Tollackson and Armstrong has used this as well over the years.  Horns set or 1-4 low.  Weiss in this case looking for a post up on the right box.  Point guard takes the ball to left slot.  Left post X cuts to the right slot.  Reverse the ball to the wing and look inside with the floor spread for your best post player.  You'll see this type of action tons from Utah State at the college level.  They run a ton of other stuff off of it too as Stew Morrill has one of the thickest playbooks anywhere.