By Samantha Bonifas
The Silver Lake Mustang Men came off of a 40-point win from the previous week ready to roll. First, the Mustangs faced Franklin, a conference rival, on Tuesday. The first quarter proved that the rest of the night would be a fight. The Mustangs headed into the second quarter with a 1-point lead, 12-11. The Mustang men edged out the Flyers with a 19-point quarter to go into halftime with a 31-17 lead. “We transitioned well and kept getting quick stops. There were opportunities for open threes and open layups and that allowed us to accelerate”, said junior point guard Keaton Karr. However, Franklin was not ready to simply hand the win to Silver Lake. Franklin slowly crawled back within distance of Silver Lake. With the help of a 23-point 4th quarter, Franklin had the game tied and possession of the ball with 5 seconds of regulation left. The Silver Lake defense played a safe, yet aggressive 5 seconds of defense to take the game to overtime. Karr commented that the team mentality contributed to this. “As a team, we play with continuity and intensity on defense. We play as a team very well. We knew what we had to and we did what we needed to finish regulation”, said Karr. The Mustang Men have had experience with overtime this season with their double overtime loss to Red Cloud previously in the season. Silver Lake’s knowledge of basketball, along with a critical 3-point shot from Tayten Menke, helped them to overcome the Flyers. As the buzzer rang, the Mustangs walked off the court with a 55-48 victory.
On Friday, Silver Lake welcomed SEM to The Barn for another home game. The teams played a competitive first half, but SEM continued to keep a steady pace ahead of Silver Lake. SEM gained control of the game in the second half, defeating Silver Lake 55-28. Silver Lake ended the tough week of play 4-10 and next plays Wilcox Hildreth and Lawerence Nelson.