Class AAAA Tournament Takeaways
High school hoops in Minnesota ended last weekend with three new teams claiming state championships. At the Class AAAA level, it was Hopkins returning to the mountaintop with a 55-40 win over Lakeville North. Here are five takeaways from the…
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Continue ReadingHigh school hoops in Minnesota ended last weekend with three new teams claiming state championships. At the Class AAAA level, it was Hopkins returning to the mountaintop with a 55-40 win over Lakeville North.
Here are five takeaways from the Class AAAA State Tournament
Hopkins was dominant in the postseason
Hopkins has never lacked for talent. But on paper, this Hopkins team isn’t so far ahead of the field that what it did in the postseason can’t be extremely impressive. The Royals won all five postseason games by double figures, blowing out St. Louis Park, Cambridge-Isanti and East Ridge on their way to a state championship. They handled Wayzata in the Section final game and had a comfortable-ish lead throughout the game against Lakeville North.
It was as complete a team effort as it gets as all five starters played big roles all the way through. Zeke Nnaji took his game to even another level in his senior season. Kerwin Walton seems to get better and better with each passing game. Andy Stafford and Jalen Dearring both came into their own as the season along, going from being the go-to guys at Minnetonka to very good glue type pieces for the Royals. And Dane Zimmer was a beast on the defensive end of the floor in particular throughout the stretch. He hauled in 21 rebounds in the state title game.
Lakeville North got to another state title
You always know what you are going to get with this Lakeville North team. They might not wow you in the warmups. They might not even wow you during the game. But its a string of stops here, a couple of 3-pointers there and before you know it, they are leading by double figures and clawing back against them is nearly impossible. Park Center almost did it in the semifinals but the Panthers just have a way of winning. Discounting their talent would be disingenuous because they’ve got great talent. But they don’t have more talent than some of the teams they routinely beat. They win because they play as disciplined as any team in the state on both ends of the floor, and winning is a habit.
Park Center had a good showing
Park Center went into the tournament as the No. 1 seed but this was as open a field as Class AAAA has had in a while. The Pirates lost to Lakeville North but it wasn’t an upset by any stretch. They backed that up with a win over East Ridge to claim a third-place finish. It’s been a while since Park Center was at the state tournament despite consistently being one of the best teams in the state and they won multiple games. And while the Pirates lose some good players, there’s still a lot of talent in the cupboard with Dain Dainja, Detavius Frierson and Josh Brown.
There was a weird amount of blowouts
Despite the Class AAAA field being wide open on paper, there was an inordinate amount of blowouts early in the tournament. Some of that lends to the notion that some of the section fields were unbalanced (Section 2 having four top-10 teams for example) but seven out of the 11 games in total were decided by double figures and a handful were absolute butt whoopings. Maybe the field wasn’t as wide open as it seemed.
Looking Ahead
There was quite a bit of turnover this year at the state tournament, as five teams that made it this year didn’t make it last year. How much turnover will there be next year? A lot of these teams appear to be positioned to be extremely strong again.
Lakeville North has won Section 1 seven straight years and while the Panthers head into a phase where there may be more unknown than known, I suspect that program is still stocked full of talented athletes waiting their turn.
Eden Prairie could be the preseason No. 1 team in Class AAAA given the Eagles bring back five starters from a team that won two games at state, but they also play in a section that is loaded with Prior Lake and Shakopee. So a return trip is far from an automatic.
Eastview and East Ridge are junior heavy teams with the type of top-shelf talent to make runs to state again and both teams could be in position to win multiple games.
Hopkins will never lack for talent and even if the Royals are losing four starters, they have Kerwin Walton, a bunch of good young players, and always seem to add good players to the program.
The Class AAAA field doesn’t seem like it’ll have a runaway favorite again next year, which is ideal and makes for a great winter.