It’s been a little over 2 months since I last released an article on the Polar Prints site but I’m back with some great updates regarding North High’s boys basketball team. 3AAA’s very own, St. Thomas, an all boys school located in Mendota Heights, Minnesota took a tough loss the night of Friday, January 19th at home against the North St. Paul Polars in Varsity competition.

Based off of last year, and the expectation of the returning players for the upcoming season, St.Thomas was to place 1st in conference with a record of 15-1. Behind St. Thomas was to be Tartan finishing second, and resting in 3rd place, North St.Paul for the Metro East conference. Over the summer, during the very warm months Minnesota had, when kids were out of school, that statement was released and the Polars used it as motivation to overcome the odds. It was also motivation for them to go undefeated once the 2017-18 season began. They felt like the underdogs.

Also in the summer, tons of high school teams competed in summer league games to get a feel for the game during the offseason. One of these games happened to be North St. Paul versus St.Thomas at Bloomington Jefferson High School. The result of that game was the St. Thomas Cadets coming out on top.

Apparently, this showed North that they had more work to do so that when the season came, they wouldn’t lose. The work that they put in, displayed itself on the 19th when the Polar beat the Cadets with a final score of 78-74. North now has a ton of confidence coming off of a strong recent win versus Tartan and they are 7-0 in conference with an overall record of 13-3. Their 3 losses came from the 4th ranked team in the state, the 12th ranked, and the 3rd best team in Wisconsin. North has 10 games left of the regular season and they’re not looking to taking any more L’s as it is conference play from here on out besides Duluth East this Saturday.

After the regular season, high school teams enter sectional tournaments in which they’re placed in a pool with 7 other teams and seeded upon their regular season records. They must win 3 consecutive games to reach the state tournament. Potential teams they must beat include powerhouses this year like Cretin-Derham Hall (ranked #1 in state, #19 in the US), Woodbury (who previously beat North this year) and East Ridge.

Tune in to see North take action on the floor tomorrow versus Henry Sibley at their place at 7 PM. Go Polars!