“You can have a tough night shooting but you should never have a bad night defensively,” Canistota Head Coach Pat Jolley said.
It may be the perfect phrase to describe the Canistota Hawks this season, but it is also a good saying for life. Sometimes things fall out of your control, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t put the effort in to succeed.
And when the Hawks were unable to play in the state tournament last season, they made sure to control what they could control, and put the effort in to get back to the state tournament.
“It was such a strange circumstance,” Jolley said of the cancelled tournament. “Right away from the start of the season, I said, ‘we can’t change that boys, but we can sure use it as motivation, and the only way to get over that is to make a trip to Aberdeen.”
The Hawks took Jolley’s word to heart and set a course back to the state tournament, but the road to Aberdeen was not without trials and triumphs. Canistota quickly reached a 6-0 record, and showed off their stellar defense by holding all but one of those opponents to 45 points or less.
“We spend a lot of time on defense,” Jolley said. “We work on it every night, we explain it. We talk about taking charges and diving on loose balls.”
And even with a loss to De Smet in game seven, Jolley and the Hawks knew they had a special team after a 65-55 overtime victory against Hanson.
“When we played Hanson in Canistota, we were down 5 with about 2 minutes to go…when won by about 7 or 8 points, I thought that was a defining moment in our season,” Jolley said. “I knew we were never out of a game and we had kids that could hit big shots, and I thought that was kind of a turning point.”
The Hawks would get another confidence booster soon after, as Canistota defeated State Qualifier White River by nine points at the World’s Only Corn Palace in Mitchell just two days after the Hanson loss.
“When you’re playing that type of competition and you’re playing in a bigger facility like the Corn Palace…you know when you can go out and not only compete and beat those people, I think it gives you a lot of confidence in your team and let’s you know you’re a part of a good team and on any given night you can beat anybody.”
Canistota continued to show off their stellar defense for the rest of the season, holding seven more opponents to 46 points or less. Even a tough loss to Viborg-Hurley couldn’t stop the Hawks, as Canistota used the February 2nd loss as motivation to take down Dell Rapids St. Mary by five points on February 13th.
“We battled with Viborg-Hurley for years and years, and when we went down there that night, they played really well. They shot the ball really well…but we felt we were better defensively then we showed that night,” Jolley said. “I told the boys the only thing you can do is go out and beat somebody. And they believed in what I was talking about and they went ahead and did that.”
Now Canistota, 21-2, brings one of the best defenses in the state to Aberdeen, but will quickly be tested. The Hawks drew Aberdeen Christian in the first round, who have arguably the most dominant three-point game in Class B.
“We are going to have to play well to be successful on Thursday,” Jolley said. “They have a lot of offensive weapons. We’re going to have to go out and play good defense against them. We have a challenge in front of us. In the state tournament, a #7 seed doesn’t mean very much.”
The Hawks will play the 18-4 Knights at 5:00 p.m., and if Canistota has anything to say about it, expect a defensive battle on Thursday in Aberdeen.
