VHS home games last week, Photo by Justin Prax
Information provided by the VHS Basketball Coach
This past weekend the Bucs traveled to Galena to compete in the Aurora Conference Tournament. The trip began Wednesday with a 360-mile trip up to Fairbanks, and then a 270-mile flight out to Galena.
The first round match up was with the #3 seeded Hutchison Hawks. This was a matchup of the 2 and 3 seeds. It was a close game through all 4 quarters with the Bucs coming out on top 60-55. The Bucs had 3 players scoring 15pts or more, one of our better balance offensive performances of the season. With this win the Bucs advanced to the championship game to face the #1 seeded Delta Huskies. Just having faced the Huskies the prior week we knew the task ahead would be tough. From the get-go the Huskies outperformed us and cruised to the victory securing the championship and 1st place birth to the state tournament.
The following morning was the second-place game which would decide our conferences second birth to state. That game would be against the Galena Hawks, the tournament host. After watching #4 seeded Galena eliminate #3 Hutchison the day before we knew it would be a fight for the final state birth. The Galena crowd comes out in numbers and voice for the games. It was a great atmosphere! At the end of the first quarter the Bucs were trailing 11-22. Galena was in control. The second quarter saw a big swing as the Bucs stayed calm and increased the pressure and outscored Galena 20-6 that quarter, taking a 3pt lead into the half. From that point the Bucs never gave up the lead. It did however get close in the final minutes of the game. The Bucs lead was whittled down to one point in the last minute when sophomore, Curtis Malcuit, had a timely steal off a missed free throw and converted an uncontested layup to put the Bucs up 3 with only a few seconds left that sealed the victory. Big thank you and shout out to the Galena School and Community for such a good tournament. The hospitality they showed the entire time was outstanding. Thank you, Galena!
The Bucs will travel to Anchorage next week to compete in the state tournament with their first-round game against Nome on Wednesday the 18th at 12:30 in the AUX gym at UAA.
