Petersburg High Schools boys basketball team remained undefeated with two wins at home against a tough team from Metlakatla this weekend while the girls team lost two road games to the MissChiefs. Both teams head to Wrangell this weekend.
The Viking boys won 64-57 on Friday and 79-59 on Saturday and Petersburg coach Rick Brock thought Metlakatla gave his team some tough competition.
“They understand how to play, they play well together and boy can they shoot the basketball so yeah it was great competition for us this weekend,” Brock said.
Petersburg is using its height advantage to run an old-school, post up and score in the paint style offense while teams like Metlakatla have adopted the Golden State Warriors’ approach of relying on the three pointer from outside. Brock thought his team ran its offense well in both games. “I thought we shared the ball when we needed to. Each quarter both games, different guys stepped up. Like on Saturday, I guess it would be Saturday morning, Mark Neidiffer had a great first quarter and then once the teams make adjustments defensively then we have other people that we can go to. So I really like the fact that we have lots of different people contributing, maybe not even scoring but passing the basketball and our spacing so I was real happy with that.”
Mark Neidiffer looks for a pass during a game last season. (KFSK file photo)
Brock also saw some things to work on against the Chiefs. “At the end of the game both nights I felt our decision making in the last 3-4 minutes wasn’t what we hoped it would be but that’s the first time all year we’ve really been in that situation. So something to learn from. Defensively we need to do a better job one on one defensive, not getting broke down. And then our transition, turning into a transition team which I think we are, we’re still too many turnovers, still putting the ball at risk when we don’t need to, so. Lots of room to grow. I do like where we’re at and I like the places we can get better in.” The Vikings are 8-0 on the season and 4-0 in 2A conference games.
Meanwhile the girls suffered their first Southeast 2Aconference losses this weekend on the road against Metlakatla, dropping Friday’s game 34-22 and Saturday’s contest 34-23. The games were both defensive battles that saw both teams in a zone defense. Petersburg coach Dino Brock said his team had trouble making shots. “They sat in a 2-3 zone make it hard to really protect the paint and you’ve gotta hit shots and we struggled offensively just hitting shots that we’ve been hitting all season. On the opposite side we really shut down a team that had been putting points on the board, scoring 50 against other people. The scored 34 both nights. Defensively it was a great job, offensively we got good looks. We just just struggled to score. Made a couple runs, had the game close both nights. Then they went on a run at the end of the game, right near the end that was a separation.”
The girls are 5-4 on the season now, with two wins and two losses in 2A conference games
Brock said he’s still moving some players around in the lineup. “Maddy Parker didn’t go down with us this weekend so Rikki Lewis started for us did a nice job. Right now we’re just kinda working on a lot of different things trying to figure out exactly what we wanna play. So lots of kids getting lots of playing time right now.”
Both the boys and girls will play in Wrangell this weekend. The teams have also had scheduled games against Craig cancelled twice already this month because of bad weather and travel problems. Those games will be made up later in the season.
