(Mondamin) West Harrison is enjoying one of their best basketball seasons in program history. On Saturday night the Hawkeyes will try to play their way to state when they meet AHSTW.
We’ll have the game on KSOM with pregame at 6:45. West Harrison head coach Rowdy Evans says AHSTW operates like a well oiled machine. “They are athletic, they can shoot the ball, they can score it, they play good defense. They were ranked #2 at one point in the season. They are as good as advertised.”
The Hawkeyes are 21-3 on the year with two losses to CAM and one against Coon Rapids-Bayard which they avenged with a 75-40 win in the district finals. Before that the team survived a close call in the district semifinals when they beat Tri-Center 58-57. “Mason McIntosh, a sophomore that starts for us, he kind of saved us when we played Tri-Center in that second round. They scored with :03.2 left to take a two point lead and he made a 3-pointer as time expired so we could advance. Last round that’s probably the best game we played all year. It was nice to see us put together our best game in a big game like that.”
West Harrison is a program on the rise. They’ve improved their win total in five consecutive seasons. It’s generated a lot of community pride. Evans says, “You can’t go get gas at the gas station without two or three people stopping to talk to you about it.” Neither side as ever advanced to the state tournament.
Evans says sharing the basketball and rebounding have been two staples of their success. He expects a great matchup with AHSTW. “This game is just hard to tell. This is a 50/50 game in my mind. It’s just going to be who shoots the ball better and plays a little better defense or doesn’t have an extra turnover. I believe it’s going to be quite a game on Saturday and will come down to a few little plays for who wins this game.”
Mason King, Koleson Evans, and Sage Evans have been dynamite for West Harrison this season. The trio combines to average 43.6 points, 26.6 rebounds, 12.1 assists, and 7.7 steals per game.
West Harrison coach Rowdy Evans:
