Staff Previews are put together by various members of the Digital Z South Dakota Staff and do not represent any one member of the site.
Yankton (5-1) and Sioux City East (6-1) will play for a 2nd straight year on Tue, Jan 5. This time, they will play in Sioux City, where East is 47-3 in their last 50 home games. This game has all the same qualities as last year’s thriller in Yankton. Yankton defeated East 65-63 to give them their first loss of the season. This season, East has won their last 6 games after losing their opener to Spencer.
SIOUX CITY EAST
East High has almost an entirely new team, but Coach Ras Vanderloo doesn’t rebuild, he just re-loads. If you like to watch coaching staff’s work, you need to watch an East basketball game. They are fun to watch, and an official’s worst nightmare. Coach Ras is 159-27 in his 9 years of being head coach at East High… And that’s 9 years of coaching basketball at an elite level.
The offensive leader of East High is 6’1 DaVares Whitaker, averaging 24.7 points a game. The junior, who already has multiple college offers, will drive aggressively and fearlessly challenge any defender in front of the rim. Junior Bie Ruei is a 10.5 scorer/slasher and an excellent defender and senior Dom Dvent averages 12.5 points. Senior Aiden Ballard and sophomore Brandt VanDyke will round out the starting 5.
YANKTON
Yankton is led by arguably the greatest South Dakota high school player ever, Matthew Mors. He currently has 2,286 career points, which ranks him 13th all-time in SD, but a mere 50 more gets him in the top 8. The 6’8 Mors has done it all this season, averaging 27 points using an array of post-ups, 3-point shots and isolating drives to the basket. The Wisconsin commit broke his own school record in the opener on Dec. 11 at Spearfish with 48 points.
Mors supporting cast is led by fellow seniors Aiden Feser (7 ppg), and Mount Marty University football commit Trevor Fitzgerald (5 ppg). Junior 6’4 Jaden Kral (12 ppg) had 17/12 in last year’s game vs East while Sophomore Rugby Ryken (7 ppg) is coming off a career high 16 points on 6-7 shooting from the field against Campbell County of Gillette WY.
Should be a great high school basketball game on Tuesday night on the east side of Sioux City.
