Prior Lake Finds a Groove vs Farmington after a First Half Mess

There were two stories in the Prior Lake vs Farmington game: "Chapter One - The High School Hoops Mess" and "Chapter Two - Pior Lake Finds a Groove".   Chapter One   I'm not sure I have ever seen a half of a game like I watched when Prior Lake played at Farmington. When I tell you it was a mess, let me tell you, it was a mess.   And just for starters, I was going to watch Hopkins vs St. Louis Park this morning but come on..... do I really want to get my credit card out and put all that information in an then have to face some journey to try and cancel at some point (and I really don't watch much Lake Conference track or softball in the spring so I have to cancel, it's 30 bucks a month!)? The South metro games are free and I don't have to insert any information..... so let's do that!   The game started off beautiful as Farmington's theme was Christmas. The Farmington staff was wearing festive Christmas sweaters, the cheerleaders had Santa hats on, and a large contingent of Farmington fans were wearing creative holiday clothing as well.   School is out for over two weeks, it's cold, the wind is about to knock down all of our Christmas decorations down all over Minnesota, fun!   Once the ball was tipped there were some instant curiosities. Prior Lake, who is 1-4, went with a starting line-up of all seniors and [player_tooltip player_id='2433515' first='Kolby' last='Thompson'] (Sambrew, Theis, Jenpa off the bench) as they try something new to get going, and that makes sense.   Unfortunately on the first three Laker possessions they turned the ball over in pretty nervous ways. So I thought.... I should pry track turnovers in case it's a theme. Turns out, Farmington was on that same vibe as they seemed to match Prior Lake turnover for turnover as the two teams raced for double figures (in turnovers) by the half.   Farmington players seemed to be skating around on the one of the court (in front of the PL bench) as three different players slipped. And in between asking us to follow him on Tik Tok so he can get to 10k followers, the streaming announcer mentioned the skating on the basketball court as a concern as well. At one point he also offered the following line which was glorious....   "he was folded like an omelette but now the Tigers are scrambling like an egg"   I also liked "a couple dings, a couple dongs, and it won't go!"   Then you had the officials. Oh the officials. Sometimes you would get called for a touch foul, other times you could Myles Garrett a guy to the ground for no call. At one point Thompson two hand shoved a Farmington player to the ground when the shot went up and the official - who was five feet away - kind of glanced at it and thought.... meh I will just jog the other way. The poor Farmington coach was like.... what?   And as I am watching the Farmington bench the next few possessions to watch the totally confused coach, the Tiger deep bench guys seemed to be enjoying a competition among one another of who had the best "6-7" hand gestures. Or maybe it was the "flop gesture". Or both!   Moments later [player_tooltip player_id='2126447' first='Briggs' last='Sheridan'] got hit from behind and he did get hit from behind on the shot. The Prior Lake coach, rightfully confused by what is a foul and what isn't late in the first half (and likely frustrated that his team was 5 of 12 from the free throw with ten turnovers and the half wasn't even over yet), got a technical foul.   The official for whatever reason seemed to give him two technical fouls but he must have changed his mind and settled on one. So after that 5-0 possession, as players continued to fall all over the place including [player_tooltip player_id='2401364' first='Benny' last='Fenske'] hitting his head on the knee of [player_tooltip player_id='2052332' first='Trey' last='Theis'] as he slipped/fell, there was another confrontation the other way. It wasn't much, just a bunch of South metro kids verbally disagreeing with as much vulgarity as the group of 80 year olds that get coffee at my local Kwik Trip have when they argue about Trump, but hey.....   the official apparently felt like that was the time to call everybody over to the opposite sideline like it's his third grade classroom, and have a little chat with the ten guys on the floor. I mean, it was like kids at recess were playing dodge ball too rough or too mean and got scolded by the substitute teacher.   And right when you thought things would be closer to normal, the cap for the volleyball hole came off and the game had to be stopped.   Chapter Two   In the second half it felt like we could get back to basketball and Prior Lake may have found the chemistry and fight they have been searching for all season.   [player_tooltip player_id='2126466' first='Kobby' last='Sambrew'] dove on the floor for a ball and moments later [player_tooltip player_id='2835671' first='Max' last='DuBore'] continued a player of the game type performance scoring at the rim in transition. DuBore also scored a three, Thompson hit a step back three, Sambrew forced another turnover pushing it to a guard who found Drew Brinkman for a three, and the Laker bench was pumped up with their 65-49 lead.   DuBore and Thompson ultimately did an excellent job of playmaking and scoring in a way that I am not sure Prior Lake has consistently seen this year. The team seemed to find a chemistry that could carry them to their 2AAAA section favorite potential.   Prior Lake handed the Tigers their first loss of the year 83-66. DuBore finished with 18 points and six assists on eight of nine shooting, Cole Brinkmann scored ten points, [player_tooltip player_id='2635710' first='Colten' last='Gunderson'] had 15 points and nine rebounds and Thompson had 14 points and seven assists.   For Farmington, [player_tooltip player_id='2126447' first='Briggs' last='Sheridan'] scored a dozen [player_tooltip player_id='2401364' first='Benny' last='Fenske'] had 17 points, Max Blandin had ten, and [player_tooltip player_id='2381974' first='Blake' last='Johnson'] scored a dozen as well.

There were two stories in the Prior Lake vs Farmington game: "Chapter One - The High School Hoops Mess" and "Chapter Two - Pior Lake Finds a Groove".