For the week: 18 games, 0 new teams (24 duplicates), 0 new players, 135.2 miles

For the season: 166 games, 229 teams (55 duplicates), 2276 players, 13,717.3 miles

Or 101.46 trips back and forth to Williams Arena, U of MN campus, Minneapolis

Finally, a recap of the tournament that was. There is a lot going on. I have a foot in the winter still with this wrap and a season wrap yet to come. And then there is the start of the badminton season. I don’t have to run out to Thief River Falls, Duluth or Montevideo for any of these events. The longest trips are about 40 minutes thanks to rush hour traffic. And I am home before six. That works better than getting home after midnight on certain winter nights. Getting back to basketball…

That’s a wrap. Four days capping off a strong 2024 campaign. Every generation claims “this is the best.” 2024 has a right to stake a claim based on previous state numbers. Was this a result of the shot clock? Are we done with the virus constraints that limited some development? Are players, specifically younger players, polishing their games at an accelerating rate? Probably yes to all questions to some degree.

My viewing patterns in this tournament was ideal. In the recent past I spent Thursdays checking up on missing teams. That meant I watched the A quarterfinals and missed the AAA semis. In the past I also missed the AAA quarterfinals for the most part. Part of that was due to the tournament structure. I wanted to see a 4v5 AA quarterfinal. That was on the Williams Arena floor this year and that is where Wednesday was spent. A viewing of all semis and finals helped give balance and perspective this year. Last year AAA only had the championship game charted. Not this year.

The tournament was competitive with some astounding performances. Still not everyone was happy with seeding. Still not everyone was happy with officiating.  Still not everyone was happy with playing times. Still not everyone was happy with crowds. There were etiquette questions. I will examine these issues with potential fixes at a later date.

Now to the meat and potatoes: A look back at each day with the pp100s and 31 Club specifically for that day.

WEDNESDAY

Got off to a strong start thanks to spending time with AAAA where all eight number one seeds found their way to the big floor. Add in the 4/5 AA quarters (along with the 1/U) and I had a six-game feast. Most of that went according to plan. The only white jersey team to win that day was #5 AA seed Crosby-Ironton as they upset #4 New London-Spicer. For the day the pp100 was a healthy 92.88, but that was also the lowest of the four days. Still, it was 1.8 better than the year before. Winners were charted at 103.7, losers at 82.07 for a gap of 21.63. Providence, the eventual AA champ, three peat at that, had a more competitive battle on their hands with Perham than many expected. The Lions met the challenge with a day’s best 120.5 negating the spirited Yellowjacket effort of 109.1, the highest losing pp100 of the tournament. The “best” game if you measure margin came in the 4/5 AAAA game when #4 seed Maple Grove broke their quarterfinal curse with a sideline out of bounds misdirection basket to topple #5 seed Lakeville North. The pp100 margin was razor thin at 1.7. LN had just inched ahead in this contest. There were some clunkers on this day with two games that could have gone to running time. Both were in AAAA quarters with #1 Hopkins and #2 Minnetonka, two teams destined to reach the final game, almost getting RT vs. White Bear Lake and Andover respectively. There were five centurions on this day. The other two quarters with St. Michael-Albertville taking down Rosemount was certainly more competitive than the above two games. Crosby-Ironton flipped the script on New London-Spicer. The Wildcats defeated the Rangers during the year by 24 in mid-January. The 31 Club had a dozen entries this day topped by sophomore Maddyn Greenway of Providence with not 51, not 61 but getting into the 71 Club with one to spare (72), the best of the four-day event. This is the second straight year where Greenway led the entire event.  The 61 Club had another soph Tori Oehrlein with 63. Senior Willow Thiel of Perham was more like Sequoia Thiel with her towering performance against Providence. She made the 51 Club with 56. Aaliyah Crump from Minnetonka made the 41 Club with 47 in the win over Andover. St. Michael-Albertville had a pair get to the 31 Club as did Providence, Perham and Minnetonka.

THURSDAY

Big school semis on tap this day. Here the rubber met the road with the average an amazing 103.8 for the four games. This smashed last year’s Thursday score of 79.8. Six teams cracked the centurion level. Only two teams failed to get to the lofty level, both 70s. clearly not close to that higher level. But this was a day for high level ball. Hopkins led the Centurions with 127.3 in the win over Maple Grove. The Royals needed that as the Crimson gave them everything they had with a tournament best 116.4 pp100 in losing. That is extremely rare. Also on the losing end with a centurion mark was Alexandria with 101.5. The “best” game measured in margin was Hopkins over MG at 10.9 pp100. DeLaSalle’s win over Alex wasn’t far behind that. Only Benilde’s stomp of Stewartville approached the running time status. A whopping ten made the 31 Club (or better) this day. Remember there were four games charted not six like Wednesday. AAA delivered two 41 Clubbers with another just missing out at 40. Tops for the day was junior point guard Aneisha Scott of DLS with 52, one above the 51 Club threshold. Olivia Olson of BSM also made the 41 Club. In AAAA Liv McGill of Hopkins had the best score as the only one to get to the 41 Club on the nose. Minnetonka again had a pair of 31 Clubbers as did Hopkins, and Maple Grove.

FRIDAY

Small school semis headlined this day. This day could not match the level of Thursday with a 92.64, but it was 1.74 better than last year. Providence again led the way with a 117.9. Mountain Iron-Buhl also joined the centurion list with 107.8. The other two winners, Goodhue and Albany hovered around 90. The “best” game if measuring the spread was 11.7 with Albany topping Minnehaha. Goodhue’s win over Underwood wasn’t far off that mark at 13.4. Providence got to running time in the win over Crosby-Ironton. That game featured the two 3000-point sophs with both again joining at least the 41 Club. Oehrlein got to the 51 Club with 55. Greenway was three off the 51 Club with 48. The difference with the two is that Greenway had help with another 41 Clubber, eighth grader Arianna Peterson. Should Providence change their name to the Vikings? Two more 41 Clubbers came in the A bracket with both Jordan Zubich of MIB and Elisabeth Gadient of Goodhue, both on the final listing for Miss Basketball 2024 getting 49 and 48 respectively. Providence with a pair of 31 Clubbers (actually 41 Clubbers), was joined by Goodhue with that good fortune.

SATURDAY

Championship Saturday kept up with the rest of the week with another strong performance. The day came in at 98.16 with three centurions and three knocking on the door in the 90s. Even the lowest was a healthy 84.8. That was about the average from last year’s 86.8. Benilde-St. Margaret’s led the way with 120.9. The Red Knights had the widest spread across the three days than any other team leaving them with the biggest exclamation point. The win over the Islanders was the only title game that got out of hand with a margin of 33 pp100. DLS ws only down 48-46 but a fourth foul to Scott torpedoed any chance and sunk the Islanders. Goodhue and Providence also topped the centurion mark. The Lions hit it on the nose and had to rally to get the victory. Their margin of 3.7 was the tightest on Saturday. That game turned on a charging call early in the second half with Alyssa Sand getting her fourth foul after an overturned call. It displeased the Husky faithful who remember suffering from a missed call in the title game with Pipestone in 2007. Oddly enough, Albany did not have the highest pp100 of any of the losing teams Saturday. That belonged to MIB with 97. Their slow start hampered the Rangers bid for a repeat. The only game that did not have centurion was the final with Minnetonka squeaking by Hopkins. It was a three point game with 19.7 ticks left. Celia Nesseth then etched her name in the pantheon of Minnetonka heroes with a rebound put back and one with 16 seconds left to give the Skippers some breathing room. Nesseth wasn’t done adding to the margin with a pair of free throws with 2.3 seconds left after a missed Hopkins 3. Tonka had to survive the late game theatrics with Aaliyah Crump on the bench. This was the second game of the day with many visits to the video monitor by the officials. The 31 Club again had ten members with Elisabeth Gadient of Goodhue grabbing high honors in the 51 Club right on the nose. Right behind her with 49s were Olivia Olson, Alyssa Sand and Maddyn Greenway. Albany had one additional 41 Clubber with Kylan Gerads on the nose. Goodhue, MIB both joined Albany with two members.

PP100S

Another strong week with a 95.51, slightly down from week 16, but that only had five games. This week had 18. The best class? AAA at 103.3, the only one as a group at the Centurion level. AAAA was next in line at 95.56. AA inched out A 92.53 to 92.5. BSM in their only two chartings was at 119.7 and 120.9, remarkably consistent. Providence had the most centurion chartings with three averaging 112.8. Minnetonka and Hopkins in their first two game were centurions but not the last. Tonka was closest at 95.5.

Just looking at the starters BSM vs Stewartville saw a 133.3 pp100 the best of the week edging out Hopkins 130.5 in their win over MG.

Overall, the winners checked in with 106.3. Losers were 84.68. That mark was better than the first 15 weeks of the season.

Just for tempo sake the Providence/Albany game had 81 possessions. But the Lions loooove the speed game with the other two game possession level 78 and 78. The most micro-managed game was Maple Grove vs. Lakeville North with a possession level of 57.

THE BEST THIS SEASON

Week	Leader	Pp100	All pp100
1	Minnetonka	122.2	80.18
2	Rosemount	138.1	76.78
3	Duluth Marshall	115.7	78.23
4	Lakeville North	127.5	75.65
5	Burnsville	88.2	73.14
6	Mankato East	105.3	75.73
7	Fairmont	108.0	81.26
8	Ogilvie	115.8	80.83
9	Rochester Lourdes	96.6	71.82
10	Benilde-St. Margaret’s	105.6	83.9
11	Pelican Rapids	118.2	81.26
12	Shakopee	111.1	76.14
13	St. Peter	120.6	82.58
14	Walker-Hackensack-Akeley	120.0	82.44
15	Underwood	118.0	84.66
16	Mountain Iron-Buhl	128.6	95.72
17	Hopkins	127.3	95.51

The big school state champs both led the weekly listings twice, runner ups twice.

31 CLUB

I charted 18 total games and there were 41 31 Clubbers, eight more than 2023. Three timers this week included Greenway, all three in the 41 Club (at least). McGill, and McKinney. Two times charted, two times on included Gadient, Lodermeier, both Goodhue; Jordan Ode of Maple Grove; Tori Oehrlein Crosby-Ironton (both 51 Club or better); Olivia Olson, BSM both 41 Club; Alyssa Sand of Albany; and Jordan Zubich of MIB.

The 41 Club had 17 members, five more than last year. The 51 Club had six, whereas last year was lonely with one. The 61 Club had a pair, with Greenway alone at the 71 Club level.

Winners were 26-15 for the week. The 26 wins matches 2023. The big difference came in losers reaching the mark. Last year was only seven.

Who had the best pp100? Not technically a 31 Club marker. Claire Stern of MG had a 190 in the loss to Hopkins. She had 10 possessions. Pushing the best pp100 with 20 possessions we get to Olivia Olson with a 152.4 in the win over Stewartville. Maddyn Greenway of Providence had a pair of games with 35 possessions. The win over Perham she had a 140. Five times in this tournament possession usage topped 30. Greenway had three. The other two? Thiel in the loss to Providence; Oehrlein in the loss to Providence.

THE BEST THIS SEASON

Week	Player	School	Grad	Score
1	Maddyn Greenway	Providence	2026	56
2	Tori Oehrlein	Crosby-Ironton	2026	68
3	Chloe Johnson	Duluth Marshall	2028	63
4	Jocelyn Land	Holy Family	2024	49
5	Livi Downs	Mankato West	2026	44
6	Lauren Bengston	Cretin-Derham Hall	2024	42
7	Rylie Cother	Jackson County Central	2025	54
8	Grace Heins	Ogilvie	2024	51
9	Katelyn Olson	JWP	2026	38
10	Mattea Henry	Woodbury	2024	53
11	Alexis Rose	Becker	2024	57
12	Catherine Walker	Breck	2025	40
13	Rylie Cother	Jackson County Central	2025	64
14	Addison Hoof	Lester Prairie	2025	49
15	Gabrielle Fineday	Cass Lake-Bena	2025	46
16	Morgan Mathiowetz	Sleepy Eye St. Mary’s	2027	52
17	Maddyn Greenway	Providence	2026	72

Greenway opens and closes the season. And she saved the best for last with a 72, the only time any player cracked that stratospheric level.

SOLOISTS

There were no soloists this year. Albany was the last one standing and Providence got their revenge for their loss in January to the Huskies.

Was 1 now 0

STREAKING

The state champs have the longest string going. Benilde-St. Margaret’s is the leader of that contingent. The big class had the two leaders heading into last week. The smaller classes have changed. Providence replaces Albany and Goodhue takes over for SW MN Christian. The Wildcats have the smallest streak alive with ten, one behind Minnetonka and Providence.

AAAA: 11 Minnetonka
AAA: 24 Benilde-St. Margaret’s
AA: 11 Providence
A: 10 Goodhue

ROAD AHEAD

It never ends….club ball try outs happened less than 12 hours after the Skippers prevailed over the Royals.

SEEDING THE STATE…THEN

If you look at week 15 with my selections you will see I was right for the all the champions. Furthermore, I got the 1/2s in AAAA & AAA correct. And if we go back 52 weeks to the end of the 2023 tournament, I was dead right with three of the four classes. The exception? Goodhue, who was still in AA was supposed to be #3 in that class. The alignments were reshuffled, and they landed in A. I did have the Rangers without the adjustments. They made the final—by the start of the season I had placed Goodhue in front.

Benilde-St. Margaret’s smashed the AAA curse with a solid 72-Bold emphatic exclamation point. The Red Knights had the widest margin of any of the winners with 29.67.

Providence led all with an average of 89.0 for the offensive side. Leading the defensive side was BSM with 46.67.

That brings the AAA tournament up to now. AAAA with Hopkins losing falls a bit.

AAAA: .688
AAA: .375
AA: .667
A: .556

I will have a few more postings wrapping up the season with a waaaaay too early look at 2025 later… could be on the weekends upcoming.