KoMets open season against top teams

In a sport like basketball or football, you’ll see a lot of teams trying to fluff their record with some easy non-conference schedule games. At the college level, you’ll see something like North Carolina hosting The Citadel in basketball or Alabama hosting Florida A&M in football. In games like that, the teams wind up getting the victory, but what are they really gaining?
With that in mind, the Kasson-Mantorville girls basketball team scheduled some tough competition in the early part of the season with hopes that it will help them improve as the year rolls along. As a result, the KoMets dropped two of their first three games in the opening week, but see brighter days ahead as they look to open their HVL schedule this week.
Their season opener took place on November 29 when the KoMets traveled to Hutchinson in a battle of two top ten teams in Class AAA. The top-ranked Tigers were able to jump out to a 43-35 lead at halftime and were able to extend it in the second half thanks to 18 turnovers from the KoMets that resulted in 17 points.
While Kristin Scott was able to pick up where she left off a year ago with 27 points, 14 rebounds and three blocks, the Tigers were able to catch fire from three-point range, shooting 10-for-22 (45%) and handing the KoMets a 79-64 defeat to open the season.
“This was a great measuring stick for us early in the year,” K-M girls basketball coach Ryan Haraldson declared. “We were able to get them into some foul trouble in the second half, but they proved to be too deep off the bench and we need to improve on our turnovers against the strength of schedule we’ll see this year.”
The KoMets would rebound a couple nights later in Austin as they found themselves in a physical matchup with their Section 1AAA rivals. K-M would lead at the half by a score of 29-16 and was able to be efficient inside the paint by shooting 15-for-24 (63%) on two point attempts.
The KoMets also made a temporary home at the free