Hermantown boy’s basketball returns 7 of 8 state stars

Last winter the Hermantown boy’s basketball team soared into the Class AAA state tournament finishing in the consolation semifinals with a 21-10 record.

Graduating only one senior from that squad the Hawks return seven of their eight top men, now experienced in winning big.

“All these guys have been there,” head coach Andy Fenske explained. “It’s not like they were freshmen or they were bench guys, they were all playing last year and that’s going to be huge. That way when we are playing some of these bigger games that we were able to pick up this season, and hopefully make a deep playoff run, they have that experience. They have those games under their belt which should hopefully give us a little bit of a momentum boost. Teams we’ve brought to state before, we’ve never had that happen to us.”

Hermantown is using this first week of practice to nail down fundamentals to once again find success in the program.

They even built their schedule around tough opponents to prepare for what they hope will be another state run.

“We’re putting in some new offensive sets and working on our presses. We’re kind of a big target for everyone in the area going to state last year so should be fun,” senior point guard Blake Schmitz said.

The Hawks tip-off their season next Friday at Cloquet.