Eskomos topple Lumberjacks in backyard rivalry

Esko never looked back on the way to a 59-45 win over Cloquet in boys basketball Friday night. The nextdoor neighbors played in Esko with the Eskomos jumping out to the 35-26 halftime lead behind strong defense and timely shooting.

"We knew Cloquet would be physical and attack the rim on the drive," said first-year Esko coach Derek Anderson. "Our defense needed to be in the right spot. We knew they'd be aggressive going for rebounds as well."

Trevor Spindler and Camden Berger led the Eskomos with 17 points each as Esko picked up its first win of the season following two straight losses.

"Both Spindler and Berger are skilled offensive players," said Cloquet coach Steve Battaglia. "I thought we did a decent job on them, to be honest. They can go off a whole lot more than they did. Both are good with the ball and they can shoot it."

A key to the win was the ability of the Eskomos to hit from 3-point range and to limit the same for Cloquet. The Eskomos made six 3-point shots, while the 'Jacks managed just two long-range bombs.

"It was a good battle by both sides," Anderson said. "We need to cut down on turnovers and our defensive rotations need to be a little quicker."

Those same thoughts were shared on the other side of the floor by Battaglia.

"We need to stay in front of people on defense. We got caught up having to help and they kicked the ball to shooters who made timely shots," Battaglia said. "They played good position defense that frustrated our kids, and on our end we didn't have enough patience to work for good shots. We forced a ton of bad shots."

Alec Leuzzo and Logan Gallup each had 11 points to lead Cloquet in scoring.

Rounding out the scoring for the Eskomos were Peyton Koskela with 10 points, Jon Stodola with seven, Corey Kauma, six, and Riley Fischer with two.

"Esko doesn't turn the ball over or take many bad shots," Battaglia said. "That also meant we couldn't get out and run much. The game was pretty slow, a lot of half-court offense which, at this point, isn't a strength of ours."

Also scoring for Cloquet were Nick Flynn with nine points, Adam Schneider and Alec Turnbull with five each, and Markus Pokornowski with four points.

UPDATE

On Tuesday night, the Eskomos faced their former longtime coach Mike Devney, who now coaches at Duluth Denfeld, and the Hunters downed the Eskomos 72-70.

Meanwhile, Cloquet followed up its loss to Esko with a 67-54 loss to the Hermantown Hawks on Tuesday night in Cloquet. Connor Bich led the Hawks with 24 points and Kaden Kucza finished with 18 points.

The Lumberjacks fell behind 33-22 and played the second half almost even up with the Hawks.

Leading Cloquet in scoring on Tuesday were Markus Pokornowski with 14 points while both Nick Flynn and Alex Leuzzo added 10 points.

Esko is now 1-3, while Cloquet is 2-3 for the season.