The Border Battle wasn’t kind to New Hampton this past Saturday as both the Chickasaws’ boys and girls basketball teams dropped games to Minnesota schools.
Not that they didn’t go down without a fight.
After a 4-0 start to the year, the Turkey Valley boys basketball team hit a rough patch to end last week. This included a pair of losses against Upper Iowa Conference foe MFL MarMac and Houston, Minnesota.
While both the girls and boys played a bit short-handed Tuesday against Central Elkader, the scoreboards didn’t show it. Both Trojan teams stayed unbeaten as the girls won 56-37, and the boys crushed the Warriors, 70-17.
Last year, the Turkey Valley boys basketball team held their opponent to under 30 points in three different games. Just one week into this season, the Trojans seemed poised to shatter that mark, as they have already achieved this twice.
The sun did rise on Friday morning, but it didn’t brighten the mood for New Hampton boys basketball coach Ryan Rausch after his team dropped a 77-41 non-conference tilt to Mason City.
Having four games in one week can be both physically and mentally exhausting. However, you wouldn’t have guessed it from watching the Turkey Valley girls basketball team, as they were able to sweep all four games with ease last week.
It wasn’t the way coach Chad Pemble envisioned the season starting, and even though the New Hampton girls basketball team is 0-3, he was pleased with how the girls played against stingy competition.
The last time Turkey Valley defeated New Hampton in girls basketball was in 2015. The Trojan boys basketball team hasn’t won against the Chickasaws since 2010.
After having a good, but not great season in 2018-2019 by finishing with a record of 11-9, New Hampton girls basketball coach Chad Pemble is hoping this year’s group will take the next step to become an elite team.
Last season, the Turkey Valley girls basketball team owned a solid record of 13-8. However, the Trojans are hoping to take a step forward and be even better this year.
