Despite losing the experience of a state tournament last season, and one of the top players in the state in Chase Mason, the Viborg-Hurley Cougars have not swayed in determination to reach the state tournament.
“I think no matter how last year turned out, our kids would have been motivated to make it this year, but there was certainly extra motivation and extra pressure. You didn’t get to play last year and you certainly don’t want to miss out on this year,” Head Coach Galen Schoenefeld said. “Playing without Chase, we have a number of other good players. We felt like we could still have a good season. We had a number of tough teams on the schedule and overall were happy with it.”
The Cougars faced a tough schedule from the start, losing to State Qualifiers Vermillion and De Smet, but those games helped an inexperienced backcourt prepare for the road ahead.
“It was some tough experience right away. Anytime is good to play good competition,” Schoenefeld said.
The Cougars then quickly turned the momentum back in their favor, defeating Hanson by five in the week after the De Smet loss and picked up another big win against Canistota to start February. That’s when Viborg-Hurley knew they had a special team.
“I think probably not just that one but certainly that one helped. It was a confidence builder,” Schoenefeld said of the Canistota victory. “That game along with the Hanson victory were big games to come out on top.”
The Cougars lost two games, against Howard and Madison to end the season, but played excellent basketball during the playoffs. Now, in the state tournament, Viborg-Hurley will face a tough Lyman team that prides themselves on their defense, in the first round.
“Kind of an aggressive defensive team,” Schoenefeld said of Lyman. “Their guards really like to put the ball on the floor and be able to try to get to the basket.”
But even with a tough road in the state tournament, the Cougars, 17-5, bring tradition and community support to Aberdeen. The Cougars have five tournament appearances and three straight runner-up finishes from 2011-2013 in their short time as a consolidated program. They also have one of the top fanbases in the state, evident from the support they give both the boys and girls teams from Viborg-Hurley that qualified for the state tournament this season.
“Ever since we started as Viborg and Hurley in 2010-2011, both Viborg and Hurley had really good following and it carried over,” Schoenefeld said.” And obviously the early success in boys basketball with 3 straight runner-up finishes. I like to think we play a brand of basketball people like to watch and team.”
The Cougars will face Lyman at 2:15 p.m this afternoon.
