Wildcats fall short against Thunder

The Blair-Taylor boys basketball team was close against the defending Dairyland Conference Large Division champions, but couldn’t get over the hump.

B-T withstood a couple of cold spells to get within four with a minute remaining in the game, but Osseo-Fairchild clinched the 68-58 win from the free throw line. 

The Wildcats will be back in action on Thursday when the team heads to Melrose-Mindoro. Next Tuesday, they’ll play at home against Eau Claire Immanuel Lutheran before heading to Cochrane-Fountain City on Friday. 

O-F 68 Blair-Taylor 58

The Wildcats started slowly, but took the lead midway through the first half. 

The Thunder scored 12 of the first 16 points in the game, but the Wildcats responded with a 9-0 run, taking the lead on a jumper by CJ Dummer with about nine minutes left in the first half. 

B-T went cold again after that, however. The Thunder scored 15 of the next 19 points to take a 10-point lead and went into halftime with a 30-18 advantage. 

“You just cannot go cold as we did in those last five minutes of the half and expect to play with a team as talented as Osseo-Fairchild,” B-T Coach Randy Storlie said.

The Wildcats cut the lead to four a couple of times in the second half, including down to 43-39 with eight minutes remaining. O-F responded again, scoring seven of the next eight points to take a 10-point lead. 

B-T was within single digits several times in the closing minutes, but the Thunder held them off.

“We played so hard but they are a very solid team. We have to shoot better than we did, but we will get to work on that and get better as the year moves on,” Storlie said.

Dummer led B-T with 14 points while Adam Halverson added 10.

B-T (field goals/attempts-free throws/attempts-rebounds-fouls-points) — Kruse 1/2-1/2-1-1-3 Dummer 7/21-0/0-6-4-14 Johnson 3/10-0/0-4-5-7 Olson 2/6-5/9-5-3-9 Dahl 2/3-2/2-1-0-7 Kidd 0/1-0/0-0-1-0 Jahr 0/0-0/0-1-0-0 Thompson 2/5-2/4-6-2-6 Beck 0/1-0/0-0-1-0 Halverson 5/6-0/2-3-5-10