by Jayden Birkner
The Musketeers opened up their season Monday night in the DuQuoin tournament. This is the first year in a long time the team is not participating in the Trico tournament. The team is hoping for major improvements from last year, as they finished with an abysmal record. They hope the hard work in the gym and weight room throughout the summer will finally pay off. The team returns their top three leading scorers in Carter Wiegard, Jayden Birkner and Alex Kueker. As seniors, along with Colby Koester and Noah Malott, they hope to flip the script this season and help lead the team to more victories. The Juniors will also play a large roll for the team this season. Guys like Bryce Amann, Wyatt Cowell, Max Simpson, Austin Grohmann, Mason Ferrell, and Parker Van Dorn will all contribute to the team and provide meaningful minutes. Lone varsity sophomore Max Diewald will also play a huge roll on the varsity roster as well. With this experienced roster and Coach Cruser leading the way, the team hopes to have a very successful season.
The first game of the round robin style tournament was against the Massac County Patriots. The Musketeers took a quick 5-0 start after a Birkner dump off to Amann for two and a Wiegard three ball. The Patriots began a run of their own and took an 18-10 lead at the end of the first quarter.
For more on the Musketeers, please see this week’s print edition.