Lindquist’s 35 Points Lead Esko To Section Finals

Wes Vork-NSO

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March 15, 2012

Dwight Cadwell-NSO

Behind the Superb effort of Jackson Lindquist, the Esko Eskomos defeated a very pesky Deer River Warrior team on Thursday night at UMD by a score of 71-68 to advance to the section finals on Saturday night back at UMD. The Eskomos will face the Braham Bombers who defeated the defending section champions the Virginia Blue Devils also at UMD on Thursday night.

The Eskomos jumped out early in the first half, jumping out to an 11-7 lead. The Warriors did fight back, cutting the lead to one point and eventually took a 19-18 lead when August Marleau hit a field goal for Deer River. The Eskomos responded very quickly as they went on a 14-1 run to build the lead to 12 at 34-20 with 4:24 remaining in the first half.

The Warriors fought for the rest of the half and made it an eight point 38-30 Esko lead at halftime. The second half saw Deer River come out strong as they opened with a 13-4 run as they took a one point lead at 43-42. Once again the Eskomos responded building the lead back to seven points at 59-50 with seven and a half minutes remaining in the second half.

“They are tough” Esko Head Coach Mike Devney commented after the game. “There Offensive rebounding killed us; they had 17 of them, that’s what helped keep them in the game and gave them a chance to win it. But give them credit, they kept coming at us.”

The Warriors would send another run at Esko and again the Eskomos fought off the Deer River effort. Senior Jackson Lindquist took over for the Eskomos down the stretch, scoring 10 of his 35 game high points and then came up with a huge steal with 13 seconds remaining. Casey Staniger hit two free throws and the Eskomos played great team defense to deny the Warriors a good look at a three point shot on their final possession to seal the three point win over the Warriors.

Lindquist, who backed up his 32 point quarterfinal performance against Mora with the 35 points on Thursday talked after the game about the scoring. “The points don’t matter to me, what is important is we got the win and as a team we have ourselves in a position to compete for a chance to go to state.” Adding “We can now focus on beating Braham, we didn’t think about them at all up to this. We have a ton of respect for Deer River and knew this would be a battle and really have taken it one game at a time.”

Lindquist also connected on the game winning basket after the Warriors had taken a one point lead late in the game when Damon Benham made a steal and a basket with 1:24 remaining giving Deer River a 68-67 lead. Lindquist drove the lane, scoring the basket and the Eskomos went on to their 25th win of the season against only 5 defeats.

“It wasn’t quite how we drew it up, but Damian Benham stepped into the play. They are tough, there great athletes and football players and come at you strong so when they took away our first option I drove to the basket and got it over their big guy.” Lindquist explained after the game.

The Eskomos will face the Braham Bombers Saturday night at UMD at 7:00 pm. The Bombers defeated the Virginia Blue Devils 77-72 as they picked up their 28th consecutive win of the season. Their only loss was their first game of the season to Class 4A power Hopkins. Braham, who has knocked Esko out of the playoffs 2 of the last 3 seasons, is playing in its first section final since 2010 when they defeated Rush City and finished fourth in the state tournament that year.

Esko has not played in a section championship since 2003 when they defeated Chisholm to advance to the state tournament. The Eskomos finished fourth overall that season in the boys class AA state tournament. Esko defeated Pelican Rapids in the quarterfinals, before falling to De LaSalle in the semi finals and a loss to Zumbrota-Mazeppa in the third place game.

Dwight Cadwell can be reached at dwight@northlandsportsonline.com