Aberdeen Central began the season with six straight wins and ended it with five straight losses, but all that is akin to distant memory for the Golden Eagle girls’ basketball program as it prepares for a SoDak 16 meeting with Spearfish tonight.
Or, at least that’s the outlook Central has adopted throughout the week.
“A lot of teams have that mindset that it’s 0-0,” said Central coach Mikayla Arechigo. “You don’t get to take the wins that you have into the game and you don’t get to take the points that you scored previously.”
The five season-ending losses and the 1-10 mark over the last half of the season pushed the Golden Eagles into the No. 11 seed, setting up a showdown with No. 6 Spearfish, a team Central beat as part of that 6-0 start to the year.
“It was only by five points,” Arechigo said. “It was a really close game. We were down almost the whole entire game until midway through the fourth quarter, so we know it’s a good team. But it’s 0-0 and it’s just fighting tooth and nail to try and get to those next three games.”
Central trailed Spearfish 14-5 after the opening quarter of that first meeting, but used a big defensive fourth quarter to take the lead. The Golden Eagles gave up just five points in the fourth, outscoring the Spartans 15-5 en-route to a 54-47 win.
Central sophomore Taryn Hermansen was a big part of that fourth quarter, scoring nine of her 20 points in that frame. Hermansen has been sidelined with an injury for a couple games, but will be available for the SoDak 16 game, Arechigo said.
And while that means the Golden Eagles will have most of its starting five back, Arechigo said some of those late-season losses had the silver lining of building some depth.
“Unfortunately, we had those losses where we were missing some kids, but it gave a lot of kids an opportunity to step up,” she said. “There’s a good chance we’ll need contributions from a variety of kids.”
Senior Caydi Withers also played a significant part of that early win in Spearfish, as she drilled four 3-pointers and finished with 16 points.
Ultimately, however, the game will come down to a mindset rather than an X’s-and-O’s gameplan.
“Every team has their strategy and they have something they hang their hat on,” Arechigo said. “For us, it’s really about attitude and effort. Going out and giving our best, whether it be on the boards or on the defensive end or making a great pass. And then just having a good attitude. If a team makes a little run, do we have that attitude that we keep the right mindset to get ourselves reset and make a little run of our own? All season, we’ve talked about the importance of attitude and effort and we’ll have to see how that plays in our favor in this game.”
Tonight’s contest is set for a 6 p.m. (MST) tipoff in Spearfish.