Unselfish Cherry Tigers Hoping 3rd Times the Charm at State Tournament

The Tigers have won their last 21 games and are on their way to their 3rd straight state tournament.

IRON JUNCTION, Minn.- There’s a saying in all sports where sometimes it just takes getting hot at the right time.

But, for the Cherry boys basketball team they’ve been on fire since the new year.

The Tigers have won their last 21 games and are on their way to their 3rd straight state tournament.

A big reason for their success has been the chemistry and continuity of the team as their roster hasn’t changed much the past few seasons.

Head Coach Jordan Christianson says the “we not me” mentality has also paid off big for his squad.

“The ball is constantly moving. Our assistant coach Jaylon Holmes he always says make sure the ball has energy. And I think that has been a big thing for us and these guys just always come to find each other. Just how unselfish everyone is. We don’t care about box scores or points or any of that staff. We’re just more focused on winning. It’s been a priority last year too but it’s been emphasized this year more than anything,” said Christianson.

Cherry will get a chance at revenge in the quarterfinals as they face the team that ended their title hopes a year ago, Russell-Tyler-Ruthton.

“We have a good shot at beating them. They’re only returning two and I think that since we have gotten all of our players that have been their twice now. I think we have the higher advantage I guess you could say. Because we’ve been there once and some of these kids haven’t been there,” said junior forward Noah Sundquist.

“We have the depth to do it. We have the players to do it, the team to do it. But, we still have to execute. We have to play the whole 36 minutes and no one is going to be able to do that with us,” added junior guard Carson Brown.

The Knights and Tigers tip things off at 11 AM on Thursday at the Target Center.