Orioles and Oriole Fans Should Prepare for an Interesting Friday

Orioles and Oriole Fans Should Prepare for an Interesting Friday

Today is Thursday February 25^th and to many people in the South Dakota High School Basketball fan group, they would be preparing for round two of girls basketball region playoffs. However for those people who are boys’ basketball fans, there isn’t much happening today. Tomorrow though marks a huge day in SD State ‘A’ basketball because it is the final day of the 2015-2016 regular season. For some teams, it means nothing but for the top three Region 4 teams, it means a lot. In this article, you will learn about how the Orioles pulled the upset on number one Dell Rapids and how the final standings in Region 4A could finish.

Last Friday the Orioles traveled to Dell Rapids to face the number one in the state Dell Rapids Quarriers. This was one of them old fashioned brawls which involved low scoring, great defense and quite a lot of fouls. In the first quarter, you could easily figure out what kind of game it was going to be as it was 10-9 Dell Rapids. In the second, Lennox scored 13 to Dell Rapids 16 to make it 26-22 at half. However the Orioles outscored Dells by scoring 30 second half points and winning 52-45. The Orioles were led by Jacob Hinker who scored 20 points and hauled in nine rebounds. However, with the defense winning this game, you could say that John Oldenkamp was the leader. Oldenkamp helped to slow down one of the state’s best players in Ty Hoglund. Hoglund who averages 26.2 points per game and averages a 50 percent shooting percentage shot just 35% and was held to just 15 points. It was this incredible defense that helped the Orioles upset number one in the State.

Now on to the important stuff. Tomorrow six of the seven teams in Region 4A will play with two of the three games meaning a lot of importance toward the Region 4A final standings. One game is Tea Area vs Beresford, and after doing the calculations Tea Area and Beresford can’t move ahead or below in the standings and so Tea Area will play Beresford tomorrow and on March 3^rd, for round one of Region play. The next two games are Dakota Valley at Lennox and Vermillion at Canton. The best scenario for the Lennox Orioles would be a win for Lennox and a win for Canton. What this would do, is it would put Lennox second in the region and Vermillion third. This would give Lennox the max amount of home games (pending if they win) and a home game vs Canton on round one. If you are a Vermillion fan, you would want Lennox to win and Vermillion to win. This would make Vermillion the number one seed and give them the bye while make Dakota Valley second and leaving Lennox third. As for Dakota Valley, if they win, they will retain the first seed and Lennox will stay the third seed.

Overall, Canton is locked in at seventh, Elk- Point Jefferson is locked in at sixth, Beresford is locked in at fifth and Tea Area is locked in at fourth. The Orioles who are currently third could rise to second but cannot fall to fourth. Vermillion is in a different situation as they could fall to third, stay at second or rise to first. Dakota Valley is the same as Vermillion though as they could stay in first, or fall to second. Now for Lennox fans, this does mean that we cannot make first. This is quite interesting though as Region 4A is so tight yet only three teams can move. Coming off last season when Region 4A had two top teams and then a lot of bottom, to see four possibly five teams who have winning records is quite a cool feat.

Now I don’t know about you, but if you get to see Lennox have the opportunity to knock off number one in region coming off beating number one in the state, I would make it a priority to be there on Friday. The Orioles will be attempt to finish 14 and 6 which would actually give them two more wins and two less losses than last year’s team that made state. So come on out at 7:20ish to see the Orioles take on the Panthers from Dakota Valley.

Thanks for reading, have a nice day and GOOOOO Orioles!