Park boys basketball lost 80-78 on a long-range buzzer beater from Chaska player Noah Slinde Jan. 24. Park fought and the score remained neck and neck throughout the game.
Coach Rob Griffin said coaching has been tough this season but the team is starting to become more of a unit. He said the team has been putting in a lot of effort, and he hopes to see their effort show in the game results.
“The season has had its challenges, but it’s what you want as a coach, spending time trying to get better as a group,” Griffin said. “Our team has been working hard this season and I want to see some results for the boys.”
Senior Cleo Mulfinger said in practice, the team has been working on their defense by working on skills such as closing out on shots at the hoop.
“We have been mainly working on defense,” Mulfinger said. “Mostly at practice, we’ve been working on closing out on shots and other things like sliding our feet and stopping the ball in transition.”
Senior Dashon Amos said his individual goals for the rest of the season are to keep contributing to his team and to improve defensively.
“(I’m) working on my craft, trying to become more shifty,” Amos said. “(I’m going to help in the defence to).”
Mulfinger said the offense has room for improvement. He said the team played up to par and the hardest part about this game was that their shots didn’t fall short.
“I think we did well. We could have done better though and taken smarter shots,” Mulfinger said. “If our shots had gone in, that would have made a big difference.”
Amos said Park played good defense but the deciding factor was that their shots didn’t hit throughout the game.
“We communicated on the defensive end and worked hard,” Amos said. “We just need to make shots to win the game.”
Griffin said some improvements that can be made in their upcoming game include finishing out a full game strong and being more consistent with their play.
“The team needs to be able to play good basketball and to be able to play basketball for 36 minutes,” Griffin said. “We are having too many highs and lows during the game and need to be more consistent.”
Park’s boys basketball’s next game is against Chanhassen at 7 p.m. Jan. 27 at Chanhassen High School.
