Huskies Hoops Teams Hold Awards Banquets

The Owatonna High School girls and boys basketball teams held their season wrap-up awards banquets on Sunday. Each team had four seniors on their roster this winter and both teams will bring back players with valuable varsity experience next season.

The OHS girls named sophomore Sarah Kingland and freshman Lexi Mendenhall as their Most Valuable Offensive Players of the year. Freshman Holly Buytaert earned the Most Valuable Defensive Player of the year award. Senior Julia Hansen won the Most Improved Player honor.

Sophomore Maggie Newhouse won the Hustle Award. Seniors Annika Harper and McKenna Schroht shared the Top Teammate award. Senior Molly Hawkins won the Husky Award.

Kingland was the lone All Conference player for Owatonna. The Huskies went 8-18 overall and 8-14 in the Big Nine. OHS lost to Lakeville North in the section quarterfinals.

Junior varsity award winners included Taylor Schlauderaff (MVP-Defense), Mariah Bailey (Most Improved Player), Grace Linders (Top Teammate Award), Ari Shornock (Hustle/Hardest Worker Award) and Audrey Simon (Husky Award).

The Owatonna boys basketball Most Valuable Player was senior Steven Eckard. The Glove defensive award went to sophomore Nolan Burmeister. The Most Improved Player was freshman Evan Dushek. The Blue Collar honor was shared by senior Jared Fett and junior Carson DeKam. The Coaches Award went to DeKam and sophomore Lane Versteeg. Fett was named All-Big Nine Honorable Mention.

Top stat leaders for the Huskies include

• best field goal percentage, Jared Fett (59.5)
• best three-point shooting percentage, Isaac Oppegard (37.9)
• best free throw shooting percentage, Nolan Burmeister (68.6)
• rebound leader, Evan Dushek (141)
• assist leader, Jack Hanson (64)
• steals leader, Burmeister (41)

The Owatonna varsity had a 7-19 overall record with a 6-16 Big Nine mark. The Huskies lost to Lakeville North in the first round of sections. Owatonna's b-squad compiled a 22-3 overall record and was 19-2 in conference games to with the Big Nine championship. The junior varsity went 19-8 and the two ninth-grade teams combined for a 22-26 overall record.