Eagles to host Tigers in regular season finale

Photos by Cheri Kopveiler
Sam Kopveiler drives to the basket during last week’s non-conference game against Battle Lake.

By Chad Koenen

Publisher

The New York Mills Eagles fell to 0-25 on the season as they dropped a pair of games to Verndale and Battle Lake last week. 

Finn Roder defends a Verndale guard near the 3-point line during last week’s Park Region Conference contest in New York Mills.

On Tuesday night the Eagles dropped a heart breaker to Verndale by a score of 58-52 in their final Park Region Conference game of the season, before falling to Battle Lake in non-conference action by a score of 80-46 on Thursday.

On Tuesday the Eagles fell to Verndale by a score of 58-52. 

Head coach Mike Baune said the Eagles continue to show flashes of solid basketball as they took an 8 point lead at halftime. 

“It followed a similar path as many other close games this year where we jump out to a nice lead, 8 points at halftime in this case, only to see them take it back and we can’t quite get the big buckets that we need,” he said. “As usual, we showed some really good flashes of a high quality team, but we still greatly lack consistency.” 

The Eagles were led offensively by Sam Kopveiler who scored 19 points, while Teagan Lausten scored 13 points and Jacob Thorsrud recorded a double-double with 12 points and 10 rebounds.

On Thursday the Eagles took on Battle Lake and once again took an early 8 point lead. Baune said he liked how fiery and intense NY Mills came out of the gate, before the Battlers clawed back into the game and took an 8 point lead of their own at halftime. Unfortunately, Battle Lake was able to find success in the second half on their way to an 80-46 win over NY Mills. 

Despite the loss, Baune said the Eagles are able to hang with most teams if they believe in themselves on the offensive and defensive end of the court. 

“When we believe that we can score and go out and do it without hesitation, we can hang with most anybody,” said Baune. “As soon as the doubts start to creep in is when other teams usually start to go on a big run against us and that’s the challenge we’re trying to shake.” 

Kopveiler once again led the way offensively with 22 points while Lausten scored 13 of his own. 

This week the Eagles hosted Rothsay on Monday night and will spend the rest of the week getting ready for the sub section tournament, which will get underway next week.