2023-24 Opening Night

Prologue
Welcome to the 2023-24 Season Opener.  For season 17 I begin once again in St. Paul.  This time at St. Paul Academy for the Spartans to take on St. Cloud Cathedral.  Another early season visit to SPA as I was there on opening Saturday last season.  Its middle school night so we get the young crowd.  No concessions for me as I didn't want to hobble over to Drake Arena on a bad wheel for those.  SPA coming with high expectations and a veteran roster.  Cathedral retooling after seeing a large senior class graduate.

Game Time
3 quick buckets for SPA as they score the 1st 6 points of the game.  Cathedral goes with a whole new bench mob of 5 sophomores after starting 2 sophomores.  Later on they'd add in another sophomore and a freshman.  That 2nd group gets a rude introduction to varsity play.  Its 17-3 SPA when Cathedral gets a timeout at the 11:48 mark.  Looks like this one will be blowout city.

SPA hits a rash of turnovers.  Sloppy ones at that too as there wasn't any real pressure from Cathedral.  After a cold start from 3 (1-9), Cathedral hits 5 of their last 8 in the 1st half.  Cathedral cuts the lead down to 3 late in the half before 6 late points from Ethan Carter lets the Spartans keep the lead at 38-30 going to the break.

Cathedral keeps the momentum going with a quick 9-2 run to start the half.  SPA 2 more messy turnovers to start the half.  So after a 14 point lead, we're down to 1 just over 2 minutes into the 2nd half.  The sophomore bench mob strikes with a Henry Sand triple and we're back to even.  The teams trade buckets and we're tied at 44 with 11:15 to play.

Then 8 straight misses and 7 turnovers for Cathedral as the roof falls in.  Its a drought of 6:30 until the next field goal.  The SPA run is 27-3 in about 8 minutes and that turns a tie game into a 20 point blowout.  Spartants senior forward Mikkel Rawdon taking it to the smaller and younger Cathedral lineup inside during the run.  SPA wins 78-58 in a game that was much different that the final score appears

Post Game
St. Cloud Cathedral starts the season 0-1.  They stay on the road next week at Becker and then a trip to Legacy.  Then in 2 weeks they open a 7 game home stand that includes their annual holiday tourney in the middle of it.  The Crusaders used a 12 man rotation with 8 sophomores and a freshman in it.  That's a crazy amount of youth but something to build with.  29 points from the starters, 29 from the bench and nobody in double figures with 15 players scoring.  Frosh Owen Grove and soph Jacob Oliver with 2 3s each for 6 points as the top scorers.

St. Paul Academy starts the season 1-0.  They get an immediate harsh test at Breck on Tuesday before returning home to play Chisago Lakes.  The senior leaders lead the way for the Spartans.  Ethan Carter leads the Spartans with 25 points including a perfect 12 for 12 from the foul line.  Tysen Hayes and Mikkel Rawdon each add a triple and 12 points.  Solid bench minutes as well for frosh John Grimsrud with 7 points.  Overall I can't imagine that the Spartans will be pleased with 24 turnovers and shooting 41.1%.  Would have liked to see them step on the gas with that early 14 point lead.  They'll want to run more offense for looks rather than some of the forced 1 on 1 looks they took tonight.

Czar Insights

For details on exactly what the value in the chart mean, click here for the full explanation of Czar Insights.  

SPA older, bigger and stronger.  That showed up in a 36-10 edge in free throw attempts and a 21-15 edge on the offensive glass.  32-16 edge in the paint for the Spartans as well. Cathedral 8 of 25 in close attempts and 13 of 36 from inside the arc.