More from North and Rice Lake

All right, my article is done and the paper has been sent to the printer. Friday's Big Rivers Conference boys basketball opener between Rice Lake and Eau Claire North certainly lived up to expectations, as the game went down to the wire.
Here's a few thoughts and observations:

* Defensively, North's added height makes it very difficult on opponents. Having Andy Kleist at the top of the 1-3-1 zone is a great fit. Kleist is 6-foot-5 and has quick reactions -- he's a soccer goalkeeper and will be one of the BRC's better 'keepers next season. His height and length makes it difficult to throw passes over him and makes it easy for the three players in the middle -- two of them 6-foot-7 Tyler Brown and 6-foot-11 Evan Anderson -- to move side to side.

* North really didn't make feeding the post a priority. Brown and Anderson combined for seven field goal attempts and you could count on one hand the number of entry passes to the post. Brown scored 16 points but half came at the free-throw line. He was 4-for-6 from the field, but was quite active overall with 12 rebounds. Anderson went 1-for-3 from the field and 2-for-4 from the line. He was fouled on a pair of dunk attempts. Anderson and Brown did run one nice high-low combination. That's something that could be a big part of the offense.

* 6-foot-5 Andrew Lochmann started the game guarding Anderson, with 5-foot-10 Tim Hovde on Brown. Lochmann was very impressive, scoring 22 points with seven rebounds and four assists. You can read more on him this season's first Inside Hoops, which will appear in next Thursday's Leader-Telegram. So be sure to look for that.

*It's almost scary how similar Alex Culy is to his older brother Dan on the court. They have that same calm demeanor no matter what the score is. They also can shoot the lights out. The younger Culy hit six 3s against North.

* North mixed between man and zone in the game. After made baskets, the Huskies would put on a half-court trap and then run the 1-3-1. After misses, it usually was straight up man. North switched to straight man with some trap in the closing minutes -- clearly coach Pat Hammond didn't want to give Culy any more open looks at 3s.

- Joe Ziemer