Hanson downs Castlewood 50-31

ABERDEEN — The Hanson Beavers controlled the lane Saturday afternoon and eventually controlled the game as well.

Hanson took advantage of its size on both ends of the floor on the way to a 50-31 win over Castlewood during the fifth-place game at the Class B boys’ state basketball tournament at Wachs Arena.

With players at 6-feet-6 and 6-feet-5 inside, Hanson clogged the lane and forced the Warriors to shoot from the perimeter. The result was just three total field goals by Castlewood in the last 2 1/2 quarters and two of those were three-pointers.

“In Class B, when you get a 6-6 and a 6-5 kid, you can be pretty good defensively if everybody can know their role and do their part,” Hanson coach Josh Oltmanns said. “Our bigs really controlled the game inside today.”

The Beavers not only contested shots in the paint, but were able to get out on the perimeter with their length to cause havoc there as well.

“We’ve been working on getting out on the wings and contesting shots all year,” 6-6 junior Matt Huber said. “I think it just kind of paid off.”

On the other end of the floor, Hanson again used its size to work for high-percentage shots inside, and then also kicked the ball outside for wide-open looks.

“When they play on our back like that, our posts should just be salivating,” Oltmanns said. “And when they come down on us hard, we’ve got the shooters that can hit some of those outside shots.”

With the Beavers in charge on both ends, it foiled what Castlewood had planned to do entering the game.

“The game plan was to protect the paint and also try to attack the basket, and neither one of those happened for us,” Castlewood coach John Rasmussen said. “I simply believe it was because of their size.”

The Warriors led 21-20 with 3:56 remaining in the second quarter when everything changed in a big way. Hanson outscored Castlewood 30-10 the rest of the game to win going away.

“Midway through the second quarter, you could just see their confidence starting to grow and ours starting to slip,” Rasmussen said. “It never got better.”

During the three games in the tournament, Hanson gave up 45, 36 and 31 points, nothing new for a squad that relied on its defense throughout the season.

“Our defense has kept us in a lot of games all year,” Hanson senior Alex Kayser said. “Without our defense, we would probably not be here.”

The Beavers held Castlewood to just 25 percent shooting on the day.

Oltmanns said the final game of the year turned out to be probably his team’s best defensive effort of the season.

“We’ve given up less points,” he said, “but this is the state tournament and these are pretty good teams.”

Jordan Feyerisen topped Castlewood with 17 points. The Warriors finished their season with a 16-9 record.

“We’re obviously very disappointed in the fact that we had to go out this way,” Rasmussen said, “but I told the kids at least it wasn’t in the districts or region and we had a fun ride.”

Hanson was led by Jordan Marquardt with 17 points. Jacob Bartscher followed with 15.

The Beavers finished their year with a 20-5 record and regrouped to take home a nice piece of hardware following a tough loss to Langford in the opening round.

“That first game really hurt,” Kayser said. “We said we’re going to come back (Friday) and we’re going to win the next one and then after we did that, we said we have to come back and we’re going to get consolation championship. It’s a great feeling.”

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