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NORTH BRANCH BOYS
St. Francis 78, North Branch 73
The Vikings started a three game slide with an overtime loss to St. Francis on Tuesday, January 10 at home.

The teams were knotted after the first half, and of course after the second half before the Saints outscored NB 9-4 in the first overtime to escape with the 78-73 win.

Brody Beaver had 34 points for the Vikings and Tyler Minke added 16. Noah Thorsen had 10 points. Every player that saw the floor for St. Francis scored in double figures with Matthew Bothun leading the way with 21.

Big Lake 71, North Branch 57
The Vikings dropped another home game, this time losing by double digits to a tough Big Lake team on Thursday, January 12.

The Hornets used a big second half to separate from the Vikings, outscoring them by nine points to extend their five point halftime lead.

Beaver had 20 points, Minke had 16 and Mason Young chipped in 10.

Rock Ridge 65, North Branch 57
The losing skid hit three games on Saturday, January 14 when North Branch traveled up to Eveleth Gilbert High School to take on Rock Ridge and dropped another overtime contest.
Beaver and Minke were again the offensive catalysts with senior guard Carson Klein out. Beaver had 23 points and Minke had 18, but it wasn’t enough, as the Vikings defense fell apart in overtime, allowing 14 points to the Wolverines.

NORTH BRANCH GIRLS
St. Francis 58, North Branch 48
The Vikings had a nice start to their game against St. Francis, but a big second half from the Saints doomed North Branch on Tuesday, January 10.

The Lady Vikes led 31-27 at the break, and they did it by crashing the boards with Ella Kuhlman, Johanna Bartkey and Chloe Lattimore. In the second half, the bounces weren’t going NB’s way and they got into foul trouble, which allowed the Saints to make their move behind Cally Peterson, Macy Hass and Josie Lupinek. St. Francis outscored NB by 14 after the break, leading to their 10 point win.

Kuhlman led the way with 16 points and 13 boards, and Katelyn Lattimore and Hailey Diaz had 10 points each.

“We played a solid first half with a lot of girls contributing offensively,” Head Coach Alison Trampe said. “In the second half we got into foul trouble and had two starters foul out which really hurt us down the stretch.”

North Branch 59, Big Lake 56
It was another record-breaking night in a close win for Kuhlman as the Vikings beat Big Lake 59-56 at Big Lake on Thursday, January 12.

She had 30 points and eclipsed the 1,000 career point mark, just the 12th girl in NB history to do it, and the fastest.

She also added six steals on defense. Bartkey had 11 points in the close victory, Diaz had eight points and five rebounds and Katelyn and Chloe Lattimore each had five points and 10 boards in NB’s first conference win of the season.

CHISAGO LAKES BOYS
Cambridge-Isanti 94, Chisago Lakes 87
The Wildcats lost a shootout with the Cambridge-Isanti Bluejackets on Tuesday, January 10.

The ‘Jackets play a fast, run-and-gun style of offense that leads to high scoring games — they’ve scored 120, 98, and 99 points in games this year — and this one was no different.
The Wildcats did a pretty good handling one half of C-I’s two-headed monster, limiting junior John Troolin to just 16 points, but the other half, senior Kobe Karels, picked up the slack, scoring 29 points with five steals.

The duel featured double-doubles from CL’s Patrick Rowe and Ian Larsen. Rowe had 26 points and 10 rebounds and Larsen had 13 points and 11 rebounds. Jack Walker had a heck of a game as well, scoring 16 points to go along with nine rebounds and four assists. Owen Larsen added 12 points and Abe Olson had 11 points in the losing effort.

Becker 73, Chisago Lakes 67
The ‘Cats lost their sixth game in seven tries when they couldn’t take advantage of a Herculean effort from Rowe to topple the Becker Bulldogs.

Rowe scored a career best 38 points as CL enjoyed a slim lead at halftime, 39-38.

But, the balanced scoring from Becker proved too much for Rowe and Co. to overcome in the second half as Becker outscored the ‘Cats by seven points and went on to win 73-67.
The next highest scorer for Cl was Zander Schmidt with 12 points, and no one else eclipsed six. Becker got 19 points eachfrom Brady Paumen and Julias Hendricks.

CHISAGO LAKES GIRLS
Cambridge-Isanti 79, Chisago Lakes 27
The ‘Cats offense was stuck in neutral last week in three lopsided losses in Mississippi 8 Conference play. Teams were keyed on star guard Emily Erickson, but it was also a brutal stretch of opponents for CL. The teams were a combined 27-8, including 10-1 in M8C play.

They opened that stretch with a 52 point loss to Cambridge-Isanti on Tuesday, January 10.

Emily Erickson led the Wildcats with eight points and five rebounds.

Becker 84, Chisago Lakes 50
In CL’s closest game of the week, they still fell to Becker, who’s played in the last four state title games, winning two of them.

CL traveled to Becker for the game on Thursday, January 12.

Erickson had nine points, four rebounds and four assists while Becker’s Danielle Nuest led four Bulldogs in double digits with 20 points.

Monticello 61, Chisago Lakes 24
Things didn’t get ay better for the ‘Cats during their extended road trip, dropping a 37 point loss to Monticello on Monday, January 16.

Again, Erickson led the way, but scored only seven points to go with eight rebounds for Chisago Lakes.

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