The Hampton-Dumont-CAL basketball teams will travel to Charles City for a non-conference basketball doubleheader Tuesday to face their future North Central Conference foes. The doubleheader will air on 104.9 KLMJ and can be watched on RadioOnTheGo’s YouTube channel.
The Bulldog boys have alternated losses and wins to start January, but have shown signs of progress, according to Head Coach Matt Lokenvitz. He says continuing to work on a free-flowing offense will help with scoring consistency, an area that has been somewhat of a roller coaster.
“Being stronger with the ball, moving the ball a little bit more with the pass, not having to think we have to dribble every time we touch the ball, not thinking we have to score after one pass, get the defense to move side to side a little bit and that’ll open up great shots,” Lokenvitz says. “We’ve been getting good shots. We want to start getting some great shots. And if we can do that, we’ll see an uptick in our scoring production, and that’ll stay more constant around that, 55, 60, 65-point range. Instead of having a 70-point game, then we have a 45-point game, then we have a 60-point game, then we have a 50-point game. So we want to be more consistent with that.”
Charles City is coming off its first win, 85-80 in overtime at MFL MarMac on Thursday. Lokenvitz says they can’t be overlooked because of their record.
“They’re athletic, they got a little bit of size, they try to really push the ball. And I never like to really look at records and those types of things. I look to see what the players do and how they really play. And Coach Rottinghaus has them playing hard for him and those types of things. It’s the same thing as last year, they didn’t win too many games last year, but they came in and beat us on our home floor, so you can’t overlook a team like that regardless of what their record is, regardless of how they’re playing at that moment. You’ve got to show up and ready to play and if you don’t, I mean they’re athletic, they’ll run you out of the gym.”
Three players average between 10 and 15 points per game, but the rest of the roster hasn’t contributed much in the scoring column.
The Bulldog girls will look to snap a six-game losing streak. They competed closely with North Butler and Iowa Falls-Alden last week, but were blown out by Algona Friday. Charles City is winless, having been outscored by over 32 points per game.
Coverage will start at 5:45 p.m., followed by the tipoff at 6:00.
