Onalaska has its best basketball team ever.
After a 79-49 win Friday over New Waverly, the squad near the lake is now 22-5 and one victory away from tying the record for most wins in school history. They will have plenty of opportunities to tie, then surpass that mark. The ‘Cats are undefeated through three games in district, with Anderson-Shiro and Coldspring left to play in the first round.
All eight Wildcats that played Friday broke into the scoring column, and five reached double digits. After just one quarter, Onalaska led 24-7. They separated further in the third with a 25-13 difference.
“They did a good job of slowing the pace down. I knew sooner or later – and we had been prepping in practice – that people were going to try to walk the ball up, hold the ball and try to just eat clock because they knew they can’t run with us,” Onalaska coach Nick Tyerman said. “They did a good job of changing the pace on us from what we wanted. It is stuff that we can work on and fix and get better at.”
The ‘Cats play mostly with seven athletes who possess plenty of endurance. The group never stops running, with fast breaks on offense and a press on defense.
“Really, they have just bought into the system,” Tyerman said. “I don’t think we are in any more shape than anyone else, but I do think we play harder than anybody else consistently. We get a lot of people that when they get tired, they stop pushing themselves, whereas we keep going.”
Generally, teams that play at a faster pace will lure opponents into playing at their speed eventually, and that was the case at times Friday night.
“There were spurts there where they got sped up and doing things that (their coach) didn’t want to do, because it is hard for a high school kid to stay disciplined in that style. It was good for us, because I knew they would do that. I saw a lot of upcoming possible playoff opponents here scouting us and watching, because everybody’s trying to figure out what the heck is going on when we are putting up so many points.”
Onalaska is ranked this season for the first time in school history and averaging around 80 points per game. Whether or not the school wants to advertise it, the message is getting out that the Wildcats are competing at a high level.
“Those things are not something I bother with,” Tyerman said of the rankings. “Because it is the first time in school history, a lot of my coaching friends say to not talk about it, but they are kids, and they know what is on the Internet. We’ve embraced it from day one and our mindset is we are still ranked too low (at No. 18). Our mindset is that we belong up there in that top five, because we are that good. I have six guys who can score 20-plus at different times throughout the year. Nobody really has that. Normally, you’re relying on one or two guys at the 3A level that are scoring 20 or 30. I am extremely blessed to coach a really good group of kids.”
Patrick Roth led the team with 18 points, Spencer Green had 16, Devon Vienneau 14, Wyatt Reyes 11 and Brayden Topkins 10.
Up next is Anderson-Shiro, a game to be played Tuesday in Onalaska. It could be pushed to Wednesday or Thursday if the weather, as expected, makes travel difficult.
