The Iron Range Preview

<p>Deer River and Eveleth-Gilbert have taken over the Iron Range Conference as of late and they appear to be the leaders once again.  Here is the Iron Range Preview.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><strong>Conference Commentary</strong></p> <p><strong>Top Ten Potential:</strong>  Deer River, <span style="font-weight: 400;">Eveleth-Gilbert</span></p> <p>I think Deer River enters the season as the preseason number one.  They have a guy that could be the MVP of Class A in [player_tooltip player_id="958848" first="Ty" last="Morrison"], the Warriors return four starters from a state tournament team, and they have several reserves back. It’s set up nicely for a run this year. <span style="font-weight: 400;">Eveleth-Gilbert</span> may not hit the top ten in Class AA this year as that’s a tough ranking to crack but if they play well they could possibly do it as they are a top 20 team in AA coming in. </p> <p><strong>Contenders: </strong> International Falls, Chisholm</p> <p>Despite losing four starters from a 10-10 the Broncos have one of the best scorers in the league returning in [player_tooltip player_id="958805" first="Jett" last="Tomczak"] plus some reserves ready to make an impact. The Bluestreaks went 10-10 a season ago but return all but two players from their rotation.  Even better, [player_tooltip player_id="958849" first="Jude" last="Sundquist"] is one of the best players in the league. </p> <p><strong>Compete with Most</strong>: Greenway</p> <p>Greenway was just a four win team a season ago which is rough.  BUT, they return an excellent guard in [player_tooltip player_id="962252" first="Grant" last="Hansen"] plus a couple other starters so they will be improved. </p> <p><strong>Rebuilding:  </strong>Virginia, Mesabi East</p> <p>Virginia was a veteran team last year and they went 8-11 losing five starters.  It’s a bit of a rebuild for the Blue Devils.  As far as Mesabi East goes, Double HH graduated (<span style="font-weight: 400;">Hunter Hannuksela) after doing so much so you wonder how much they will improve from 2-15 giving up 84 points a game. That 84 a game was the worst in the league by 15 points. </span></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><strong>21-22 Conference Predictions</strong></p> <ol> <li>Deer River</li> <li><span style="font-weight: 400;">Eveleth-Gilbert</span></li> <li>Chisholm</li> <li>International Falls</li> <li>Greenway</li> <li>Virginia</li> <li>Mesabi East</li> </ol> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><strong>Preseason All Iron Range Conference</strong></p> <p><strong><u>First Team</u></strong></p> <p>[player_tooltip player_id="958848" first="Ty" last="Morrison"] of Deer River (sr)</p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Will Bittmann</span> of <span style="font-weight: 400;">Eveleth-Gilbert (sr)</span></p> <p>[player_tooltip player_id="958849" first="Jude" last="Sundquist"] of Chisholm (sr)</p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">[player_tooltip player_id="958805" first="Jett" last="Tomczak"] of International Falls (sr)</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">[player_tooltip player_id="958851" first="Mikhail" last="Wakonabo"] of Deer River (sr)</span></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><strong><u>Second Team</u></strong></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">[player_tooltip player_id="962260" first="Carter" last="Mavec"]</span> of <span style="font-weight: 400;">Eveleth-Gilbert (jr)</span></p> <p>[player_tooltip player_id="962252" first="Grant" last="Hansen"] of Greenway (jr)</p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">[player_tooltip player_id="962318" first="Sam" last="Rahier"] of Deer River (jr)</span></p> <p>July Abernathy of Chisholm (jr)</p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Tait Kongsjord of Deer River (sr)</span></p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p><strong><u>Third Team</u></strong></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Carter Flannigan of Eveleth-Gilbert (sr)</span></p> <p>Westin Smith of Greenway (sr)</p> <p>Knute Boerger of International Falls (sr)</p> <p>[player_tooltip player_id="1288753" first="Ethan" last="Williams"] of Deer River (jr)</p> <p>Ethan Hanover of Virginia (sr)</p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Brayden Leffel of Mesabi East (sr)</span></p> <p>&nbsp;</p>