If you sat down with Humboldt High School boys basketball coach Dave Taylor Tuesday evening, you wouldn’t know that his team had just beat league-foe Leon-Bluestem 69-63.
No, with the way Taylor was still fuming minutes after the game, you’d think the Cubs had gotten flattened by the Lions.
“We got outplayed in every facet of the game for three quarters,” Taylor said. “In every facet of the game. (Bluestem) is a scrappy bunch and their coach does an awesome job. They did everything I told the team they were going to do and we just didn’t attack it correctly. It was poor execution.”
And the thing is, he’s right.
Bluestem — a team that is now 4-9 — was the aggressor for most the game. They out-rebounded the Cubs despite being a much smaller team, they made more free throws than Humboldt shot in the game and they turned the Cubs over 18 times.
Humboldt trailed by two at the half even after they rattled off an 8-0 run to end the second quarter.
It would be the third quarter though where the Cubs really shined.
Humboldt took its first lead since early in the second quarter with 5:04 left in the third quarter. The Cubs then springboarded to a 23-10 quarter that gave them a 12-point lead going into the fourth.
“We simplified the game to play it the way that you’re supposed to play it instead of doing too much,” Taylor said. “The game slows down when you do the simple things.”
The Cubs seemed well on their way to a comfortable win when the Lions got back at it and Humboldt slipped back into the same type of play that killed them in the first half.
Bluestem finished the half on a 19-6 tear to get as close as six but no closer.
“A good team is disciplined enough that they can do the same thing over and over again,” Taylor said. “And if that doesn’t work, then you do something else. We have a tendency to do something else when what we do over and over again in practice is working.”
Seniors Hesston Murrow, Colin Gillespie, Lane Daniels and Wyatt Seufert all led the way with 12 points while junior Tucker Hurst had 10.
