The last time a Class B school won three boys’ state basketball titles was Webster in 1946-48, and that was under the two-class system. Fast forward to today and De Smet can celebrate the same achievement, in the three class system, as the Bulldogs beat Lower Brule 62-48 for the title.
“It’s fun that we can talk about it but just this group of guys, so special they had this little weight on their shoulders, you’ve been here but now you’re new guys can you go do it , and they did,” De Smet head coach Jeff Gruenhagen said.
A year ago, De Smet was the big favorite for victory. After all, they won it in 2021 and got most of their key players back. But this year they entered the season without some of those highly touted players from the previous run – Rett Osthus and Kalen Garry to name a few.
Coach Gruenhagen admitted that this year’s title was different from the previous two.
“Maybe there were more question marks, whereas last year it was ‘hey, you should just go out there and do this, you’ve already done this. This year is so special, because the juniors and seniors here are the class we started with as third and fourth years,” Gruenhagen explained. “Training with my own son here tonight, starting for us there and playing in a state championship is awesome.”
Saturday night’s ‘B’ Championship in Aberdeen was a rematch of last year. While De Smet lost some key players from the previous year, Lower Brule saw many of their players return. But again, late in the game, much like 2022, the Bulldogs found a way to pull away, slightly, in the scoring column.
De Smet was led by senior Damon Wilkinson who had 18 points and 20 rebounds in the contest. The only time Wilkinson was out of a game during the three-day event was for a few seconds on Saturday night after being tossed around. Wilkinson mentioned a solid defense as the key to De Smet’s success in the tournament.
“Just to come back and play defense against them. We knew it wasn’t going to be easy. We knew we had to play four quarters to win the basketball game,” Wilkinson said. “We started slow against Viborg-Hurley, continued to play defense and turned our defense into attack. Continued to play good defense against Aberdeen Christian. It was the lowest game we’ve held them to, the lowest score they’ve had all year, and tonight too. It’s a very good team to score and only collected 48 points.
Tom Aughenbaugh also stood out in the scoring column with 16 points for the Bulldogs. On the other hand, Lower Brule was led by a trio of top executives – Brian LaRoche Jr, Gavin Thigh and EJ Langdeau. Together, the three had 41 of the Sioux’s 48 points.
De Smet will earn three senior diplomas this spring.
Dakota Valley and Yankton won the other two men’s basketball titles on Saturday night. For the Panthers, it was their second straight “A” title, which also includes a 53-game total winning streak heading into next season. And for Yankton, it was the Bucks 11e state title and their first since 2018.
