WHITEHALL — With seniors Evan Thomas and Hunter Osborne back in the lineup, Whitehall is showing flashes of the team the Vikings expected to be all year, and they closed the regular season with one of their best efforts.
Hot shooting early and effective inside basketball late proved to be a great combination as Whitehall rolled past Oakridge, 69-34, in its regular season finale.
Thomas said he suffered high ankle sprains on both his legs on New Year's Day that hampered him for several weeks; he is close to 100% now, he added. Osborne also missed several games in December and January. Back on the court and back in form, their performances Friday were instrumental to the win.
Thomas scored nine first-quarter points on his way to a game-high 24, and Osborne had 16 points and 10 rebounds in the win. The Vikings' third senior being honored, Corde Anderson, scored nine points - seven of them early in the third quarter as Whitehall began to pull away.
"They continue to grind," Whitehall coach Christian Subdon said of his senior trio. "(This year's) not up to their expectation, either, and they could have packed it in...and they didn't. Some of our younger guys have bought in. They have continued to grind, and it's a long season, especially when you're not winning as much as you think you should. I'm proud of them, and hopefully we can see some of the fruits of our labor here next week."
Whitehall's Corde Anderson is chased down from behind by Oakridge's Bryce Falbe during Friday's game at Whitehall. Anderson had 9 points in the Vikings' 69-34 win.
Whitehall had early success from the outside, as Thomas and Osborne each made an early three-pointer and combined to score all 14 of the team's first-quarter points to build a 14-9 lead. Though the Vikings sputtered in the second quarter on offense, strong defense enabled them to maintain the edge. The team had a 36-22 rebounding edge and forced 17 turnovers while holding the Eagles to 24% shooting.
"We want to continue to get better defensively, which I think we've done so far this year," Subdon said. "Even in some of the losses that we've taken recently, our defense has been much better, and our effort has been there."
After halftime, Whitehall went to the paint, feeding Anderson for seven quick points, including scoring an and-one basket on a fast break with an impressive pass from Rex Pumford (who received a nice pass in turn from Elijah Smith). Anderson missed the free throw, but Thomas grabbed the rebound and scored to make it a four-point possession, forcing an Oakridge timeout.
From there, Thomas again took over, scoring eight third-quarter points. Osborne added a trey in the frame.
"I feel like when me and Corde get going inside, it's really hard for other (teams)," Thomas said. "Once we get going, I feel like we're pretty unstoppable."
Whitehall seniors Corde Anderson (34) and Evan Thomas embrace after Thomas checks out of Friday's game against Oakridge. Fellow Viking senior Hunter Osborne keeps an eye on teammates. Whitehall won the game, 69-34.
Subdon described that sort of inside-outside attack as "the ideal game plan" for Whitehall, adding that although the team's best shooters, Pierce Westerlund and Alex Winczewski, didn't catch fire Friday, hopefully they'd bring that form to the postseason.
The Vikings open district play with a clash against rival Montague Monday. With a win, old nemesis Spring Lake would await in the semifinals. The last three times the teams have met in the postseason, the winner of their regular-season game lost in district play. While Subdon knows better than to chalk up a win over the Vikes' archrivals, he'd love to see that script play out again this year; Spring Lake beat Whitehall early this season.
"This is the perfect game that we needed to get to the districts and get our confidence back up," Thomas said." At times tonight we struggled, but it showed that we could also get out of that hole. We weren't scoring much, and then we figured out what we needed to do to get it going again. We're looking forward to this week."
