No Surprise at 2018

The summer club season is finally over, so we’ll be publishing our final team rankings this week. Starting with the 2018s, there are a grand total of 2 easy choices here, and those are 1) North Tartan 11th EYBL and 2) Stars 11th Hersch. After that come a good 7 clubs that all had their high points, their signature wins, their moments that make you want to put them in the top 5. But, 9 teams can’t fit into the top 5. Sorry.

I should mention that, as we go through the other 3 age groups, generally speaking it is pretty hard for our Team of the Year in each age group to be anybody other than the #1-ranked team. But, I will hold out the possibility that some big surprise team that was ranked #15 in the pre-season and climbed up to #3 could be team of the year. You’ll have to wait and see. Here, one could say that Stars DeSart and So Minn Fury 2018 Elite had their big moments, among others, but not that big, and North Tartan 11th EYBL is our #1-rated team and our Team of the Year among the 2018s.

Let me add that the W-L records published here and in our ranking tables were painstakingly compiled…and they are undoubtedly wrong. Many clubs do not publish their schedules and the vast majority do not publish their results. So we pored over the results from every tournament we could think of to check. But I have no doubt that some clubs played in tournaments that were not mentioned on the club Web site and which we therefore had no inkling to go and try to find. But, despite their inevitable misses, they (the W-L records) give you a pretty good idea of who’s who and what’s what, and we’re sticking to our story.

Final Team Ranking—Class of 2018

In the flagship class, the class of 2018, then, it’s no surprise that North Tartan 11th EYBL (or North Tartan 11th Nike) is our #1 team. This is not a great Tartan flagship team by any means, playing about .500 ball in the EYBL. They lost to arch-rival All-Iowa Attack 11th Nike 66-65 at the Meltdown and, then, down in Ames, IA, AIA put a 66-46 hurt on ‘em.

But they knocked off Minnesota’s next-best, Stars Hersch, 3-for-3, and they’re unbeaten overall against Minnesota opponents. It goes to show how tough the EYBL is, or how hard Tartan works to prevent losses to backyard rivals, or both. Shooting guard Sam Haiby, forwards Megan Walstad and Emma Grothaus and point guard Megan Walker all made our summer all-state team.

2. Stars 11th Hersch has had a better season as compared to expectations than Tartan EYBL. They knocked off All-Iowa Attack 11th EYBL which, in turn, beat Tartan 66-65 at the Meltdown and 66-46 in Ames. And, they also beat a Texas Elite team with 6 high D1s on it at the recent UA Challenge 62-60 on a Heaven Hamling bomb from the deep corner. They also won their division at the Summer Kickoff and at UA Challenge events both at Bloomington, MN, and Ankeny, IA, to close out the year on a big upper.

But, they lost 3-of-3 versus arch-rival Tartan EYBL. So, #2 it is. Most observers agreed that Hamling was their MVP.

3. Fury 2018 Elite was up and down, with a 4th at the AAU. They moved up a notch in these ratings after a 63-40 win over Metro Stars Wiese at the Meltdown. They also won their division at the Great Plains. They finished up 2-3 in Ames, good for 5th place in the top division, the Red. Post Monika Czinano had a particularly nice final summer of AAU play.

4. Metro Stars 11th Wiese took 3rd in the AAU and went 5-2 with a division title at the Battle of the Hardwood. Slipped a little, going 5-6 in July with a loss to Fury Elite. Guards Rachel Hakes and Amanda Pollard won praise for their play.

5. Stars 11th DeSart took 6th at the AAU and went 2-2 in June. But, they had a busy and successful July, going 15-6 and winning their pool in the Run 4 the Roses, the Battle of the Boro and the UA Challenge in Ankeny. They edged Stars Amundson in Ankeny 40-35. Noelle Josephson had a great summer, as did coach Jim DeSart.

6. Fury 2018 Gold took some lumps against a tough schedule. They parlayed the dreaded 9th seed at the AAU into a, er, 9th place finish, and went 2-6 in June. But, they turned it around by going 13-7 in July, and finished on a very high note, defeating Tartan 11th Elite 45-40 in Ames. Kenzie Rensch provided much of the glue to keep the Gold pushing forward through good times and bad.

7. North Tartan 11th Elite, their second string, went 24-19 under coach John Herbrechtsmeyer. They lost to Tartan’s flagship 11th EYBL just 40-36 at the Meltdown, but finished with a loss to arch-rival Fury 2018 Gold 45-40 in Ames. They had defeated Fury Gold 39-21 earlier in the year.

8. Tayler Hill 11th Elite lost guard Masengo Mutanda to an ACL in the early going and finished 7th in the AAU. They went just 4-1 the rest of the way as Morgan Hill had a nice scoring summer.

9. So Minn Fury 2018 Elite was on top of the world for a day at the AAU prelims, beating Metro Stars Wiese and Tayler Hill 17U Elite to win their pool. But Syd Schultz went down with a concussion and the SMF lost 7 straight games to drop to 8th place. But, they bounced back by going 13-10 with Schultz in and out of the lineup the rest of the way.

10. Comets 11th Elite took 10th at the AAU and went just 1-5 in June. But they had a nice July, going 7-3, including a pool title and overall 4-1 at Nike. Guard Emma Schmidt impressed.

11. Rise 11th Purple, led by 3 Sleepy Eye athletes, were a disappointing 4th in D2 at the AAU. But, they kept busy and went 9-8 in June and July.

12. Cyclones won D2 at the AAU, then went just 2-2 the rest of the way. Nicole Herbranson dominated.

13. Stars Walters finished 13th in the AAU and went 11-10 the rest of the way.

14. So Minn Fury 2018 Gold had a terrible AAU tournament but went 8-10 the rest of the way.

15. Warriors Elite skipped the AAU, went 6-2 in June and went 1-4 in July. Had signature wins over Fury Gold and Crossfire Erlien.

16. MN Nice skipped the AAU and played very little in the early going. But they won their first 10 in July at Nike and at the UA Challenge in MN. But, an 0-5 finish at the Ankeny UA event took some of the wind out of their sails.

17. Force Wyse had a nice AAU tournament, finishing 11th, then went 4-5 the rest of the way.

18. Suns R. Long skipped the AAU but went 9-5 and won their division at the Summer Jam. But, they followed that with an 0-4 July.

19. Thunder 2018 also skipped the AAU, then came out of nowhere to go 7-2 in June.

20. Crossfire Erlien finished as runner-up in D2, then went 3-4 in June.

Honorable Mention goes to Heat 11th Vang and High Impact 11th Caddy.

And, a special shout-out to 43 Hoops 2018 Carr, who was Tartan's primary competition for the state title through the years but disbanded just this year with a move to Kansas by the Carr family. I think Tartan's separation this year came in part from the demise of 43 Hoops. Once upon a time, Tartan and 43 Hoops had all the talent in this age group. When 43 Hoops disbanded, 2 of the top players went to Tartan–Megan Walstad and Syd Stapleton. The 43 Hoops kids dispersed in such a way that nobody else moved up to fill the gap.

We will have an 2018 All-Summer team and a 2018 Coach of the Year over the next week or two. Watch for it.