Pine City Pioneer, Jesse Logan
On Monday, April 9, members of the Pine City Dragons boys basketball team and their families assembled for their end-of-season awards banquet. The Dragons had a great year, finished 23-6, won a share of the Great River Conference for the first time in a decade, and made it to the Section 6AA semifinals for the second year in a row.
“It was a great season,” said Dragons head coach Kyle Allen. “These guys bought in to what we’re doing and they all came together. We talked about roles, and each guy, to a man, knew what his role was and did it to the best of his ability.”
The Dragons set some pretty gaudy records in the process. The team made more three-pointers than any other team in the history of the state of Minnesota, making a total of 360 from downtown, and breaking its own state record from two years ago. Pine City finished with the sixth-most steals in a season in Minnesota history as well. The Dragons were also #1 in the state in point differential (25 ppg), #5 in points per game (73.4), and #6 in points against per game (48.4) as they recorded their third 20-plus win season in the past four years.
As far as individual game records, Pine City now owns the second, third, fourth and fifth best games in the history of the state in made threes.
Individual player awards were given out and captains Jake Rademacher and Clay Logan came away with the top honors. Both were selected as All Section and All Conference honorees. Rademacher also won a very noteworthy All State Academic and Triple A winner, Team MVP and Dragon Award winner. Logan was named Offensive Player of the year and finished fourth all-time in school scoring with 1,230 points.
“These two captains,” Allen said, “we really got on the same page this year and they did everything I asked. I couldn’t be more proud of their accomplishments.”
Junior Nick Hansmann was named All Conference for the second year in a row and won the team’s Hustle Award. Junior Jake Adams was named All Conference for the first time, and also took home a share of the Hustle Award. Sophomore Seth Logan was named All Conference Honorable Mention and Most Improved Player.
Other team award winners were Jake Lunceford as Defensive Player of the Year, Caleb Fromm, Hustle Award, Damien Schwab, Teammate Award, and Koleman Lind the Eye Opener.
Allen also thanked his seniors, and put their accomplishments in perspective.
“It was an amazing ride,” added Allen. “Putting a year on the banner, beating the #1 seed in our section, undefeated at home, 11-game winning streak, this year’s senior class is the winning-est senior class in school history. These guys did it all, and they did it with swagger. You know, I heard about this group coming up, how they had a lot of success, they won a lot of games, and they carried that over. They were very successful here and I’m proud of their accomplishments.”
The Dragons had Clay Logan, Jake Rademacher, Nick Hansmann and Jake Adams (not pictured) named to the Great River All Conference team. Seth Logan received All Conference Honorable Mention.
