CREIGHTON — Things might be coming together for the Wausa boys basketball team at an ideal time.
The Vikings (5-4) won their third straight game heading into the 2024 portion of their campaign, culminating with two impressive and important wins last weekend to claim the championship of the Creighton Holiday Tournament.
Their good fortune started with a defensive struggle against the rival Bloomfield Bees, who have put together a 7-3 record so far this year.
The Vikings held on tight for a 38-30 victory on Dec. 29 in a slugfest that would have brought old-school fans to their feet.
“We played good team defense and found (a) way to win against a good Bloomfield team,” Wausa head coach Tim Schindler said.
The Vikings led 17-15 at the intermission, blew the game open with a 15-6 third quarter and then held on against the nemesis Bees.
Wausa was led by freshman Matthew Schindler (eight points), junior Colton Baue and sophomore Preston Schlote (seven points apiece) and junior Brady Bloomquist and senior Cashe Carlson (six points each).
Then on Dec. 30, the Vikings saw themselves involved in a higher-scoring affair and were able to find a way to win that way, too, in a 57-51 decision over Boyd County (4-4).
Wausa rallied from a 32-29 halftime deficit, taking a two-point lead in the final eight minutes and hanging on from there.
Baue (15 points), Bloomquist (14 points), Carlson (10 points) and Matthew Schindler (nine points) did most of the heavy lifting in the scoring column.
“In the championship, Boyd came out swinging and wanted to win in a rematch from earlier in the year,” Coach Schindler said. “We did a good job of taking that punch in the first half except for some defensive errors in the second quarter against their best player.
“We adjusted some things at the half and were able to put together a good third quarter and start to the fourth,” he said. “Some turnovers toward the end made it interesting, but the guys dug in and made enough plays to win.”
The players saw a positive in winning multiple ways this past weekend.
“I think it helps to know that we can score and play defense,” Bloomquist said. “Whenever we need to be in a defensive game, we can win by playing defense. If we’re scoring against other teams, we can win doing that, too.
“We feel more confident as a team and we think we can win any game that we go into,” he said. “We figured out how our team is actually going to play together because we have older and younger guys. We’re finally mixing it in.”
Wausa will return to action on Jan. 4 with the opening round of the Vikings’ own Post Holiday Tournament and they open play against Lutheran High Northeast (11-0).
“It will be a tough game, but I am excited for the challenge,” Tim Schindler said. “We have to limit turnovers and win the rebounding department.
“I am super proud of them,” he said. “Nobody usually looks great coming out of break. They showed a lot of heart and grit in both games. Their families, school and community should be proud of them. We took a step in the right direction of getting better as a team and as a family. That’s all I care about.”
Bloomfield 9 6 6 9 — 30 Wausa 7 10 15 6 — 38 Boyd County 15 17 9 10 — 51 Wausa 14 15 14 14 — 57
