2025-26 Opening Night

 

Prologue
Welcome to the 2025-2026 season opener.  Its a unique experience this year as I'll take in a brand new conference and gym to start the year.  This year we open with Minnesota Christian Athletic Conference action.  Its a doubleheader as the Cambridge Christian Boys JV and Girls along with the Owatonna Christian Boys visit Fourth Baptist Christian in Plymouth.  Nice weather, no other games to do, so why not?

Minnesota Christian Athletic Conference you ask?  Isn't that the MCAA?  No folks its not.  The league is in its 2nd year and is comprised of non-MSHSL schools.  That's why they could play tonight.  MSHSL schools can't even scrimmage yet and have to wait another 5 days to play.  The league formed due to the union of the old Christian Athletic League along with Minnesota Association of Christian Schools (MACS) teams.  For those of you who remember Christian Life out of Farmington before they merged with Bethany to form United Christian, they were once a CAL member so not unheard of for the schools to move up.  Like any small school league, teams sometimes move to just a JV level for a couple of years to make things work.

The league is spread out all over the place.  This year for boys basketball its 16 teams split into North and South Divisions as follows.

North:
Cambridge Christian Warriors
Chisago Lakes Baptist Patriots (Chisago City)
Faith Christian Saints (Foreston)
Good Shepherd Lutheran Rams (Elk River)
Lake Region Christian Hornets (Baxter)
St. Cloud Christian Warriors
St. Francis Christian Patriots
Woodcrest Baptist Academy Warriors (Fridley)

South:
First Baptist School Crusaders (Rosemount)
Community Christian Eagles (Willmar)
Fourth Baptist Christian Warriors (Plymouth)
Immanuel Lutheran Trojans (Mankato)
Liberty Christian Golden Eagles (Chippewa Falls, WI)
Owatonna Christian Sabers
Prior Lake Christian Royals
Rochester Area Homeschool Defenders 

Fourth Baptist is a fitting place to be introduced to the league.  For many years it has been the host of the MACS state tourney at the beginning of March.  The cafeteria/atrium area right outside the gym is super handy.  I love the irony of having a Pepsi beverage cooler but selling nothing but being a Coke shop.  No thank you, Dr Pepper please.  I can let that slide for a nice variety at the concession stand, including pizza.  They even had Chick-Fil-A on the menu at the state tourney.

Also a fun fact that I didn't know.  I looked up at the 1000 point scorer banners and there was the name Gresyn Rennie.  Hmmm, that name sounds familiar. He played his sophomore year at Armstrong and then finished his high school career for 2 years at Maranatha Christian.  Very productive high school player. But before that, he was a 3 year varsity player and 1000 point scorer for Fourth Baptist.

Game Time
Now to the games, the boys JV game ended up being the best game of the night.  The home squad came from about 10 down and hit a 3 with 15 seconds to go to win a low scoring affair 35-34. Beyond that its was all blowouts.  In the girls came, Cambridge Christian rolled 53-20.

The boys game had blowout written all over it.  Owatonna Christian didn't have a varsity team in the league last year and dressed 7 underclassmen for this one.  Fourth Baptist coming off a 18-8 league record last year.  They return league player of the year candidate Grant Vikander and 2nd teamer Elijah Forman. It was ugly and quickly.  11-0 Fourth Baptist jumped out just 3 minutes into the game.  They'd stretch that to 29-0 before Owatonna Christian finally got on the board almost 10 minutes in.  46-6 Warriors at half.  They put on the brakes in the 2nd half to keep the score down.  Only 2 field goals in each half for the Sabers.  Fourth Baptist rolls in the MCAC opener 67-13.

Too much size and experience for Fourth Baptist.  Their 3 bigs all dominate.  Senior Grant Vikander 10 points and 7 rebounds in limited minutes.  Senior Carlos Flodstrom 10 points.  Soph Lukyn Williams off the bench behind them with 14 points and 8 boards.  He looks like he'll be a major factor inside for the Warriors the next 2 seasons.  Tyler Stevens and Christian Hoffman each add 9 points.  Nice zone offense from Fourth Baptist vs the 2-3 zone.  For Owatonna Christian, Aidan Seagrist 8 points and a pair of 3s to lead the Sabers.