Jacks Advance to Section Finals

Photos by: Joshua Cadwell

Kerry Rodd-NSO

The Cloquet Lumberjacks defeated the North Branch Vikings by a score of 66-40 in the section 7AAA semi finals at the Hibbing memorial Arena Tuesday night to advance to the section finals Thursday night.

It will be Cloquet and Hermantown in the Section 7AAA title game on Thursday night in boys basketball.  Tuesday night the Lumberjacks throttled North Branch 66-40 and the Hawks slipped by defending sectional champion Grand Rapids 53-47.  The championship game will be rematch of last years sectional semifinal double overtime game that saw Cloquet win before losing to the Thunderhawks in the title tilt.

In Cloquet’s win over North Branch the Lumberjacks used a strong inside-out game in delivering a win, and two fast starts at the beginning of the game a 10-0 run, and a 13-0 run to start the second half were more then enough for the Lumberjacks who put the game in running time in the second half.

  The Vikings, who Cloquet defeated three weeks ago by a narrow margin, were content on double-teaming the Jacks leading scorer Adam Laine in the low post.  Laine was consistently able to kick the ball back outside and the Jacks knocked down shots to notch the win. 

Laine led the Jacks with 16 points, while Dillon Johnson added 13 and Jake Bushey recorded 10 points.  Nate Weets added nine for Cloquet, while both Zach Gerlach and Mason Brenner finished with six points each.

The Cloquet vs Hermantown game has been moved from Hibbing to Duluth East on Thursday night and will be played at 7pm.  The game can be heard on WKLK-FM 96.5.

Kerry Rodd can be reached at Kerry@northlandsportsonline.com