Basketball Preview: St. Paul Lutheran Saints vs. Wellington-Napoleon Tigers
The St. Paul Lutheran Saints will head out on the road to face off against the Wellington-Napoleon Tigers at 7:00 p.m. on Friday. St. Paul Lutheran is looking to tack on another W to their three-game streak on the road.
St. Paul Lutheran pushed their score all the way to 74 on Tuesday, but even that wasn't enough to win. They took a 80-74 hit to the loss column at the hands of Versailles. While losing is never fun, St. Paul Lutheran can't take it too hard given the team's big disadvantage in MaxPreps' Missouri basketball rankings (they are ranked 244th, while the Tigers are ranked 48th).
Meanwhile, even though Hardin-Central scored an imposing 55 points on Thursday, Wellington-Napoleon still came out on top. Wellington-Napoleon took their game against the Bulldogs 62-55. The victory made it back-to-back wins for Wellington-Napoleon.
Trotter Hughes continued his habit of posting crazy stat lines, scoring 34 points along with seven rebounds. As a matter of fact, that's the most points he has scored all season. Another player making a difference was Haden Terrill, who scored nine points along with six rebounds and five blocks.
St. Paul Lutheran's defeat dropped their record down to 9-7. As for Wellington-Napoleon, they have been performing well recently as they've won eight of their last ten matches, which provided a massive bump to their 10-10 record this season.
St. Paul Lutheran didn't have too much breathing room in their contest against the Tigers in their previous meeting back in February of 2023, but they still walked away with a 70-66 win. One of the biggest obstacles trying to stand in the way of that victory was Wellington-Napoleon's Elijah Owens, who scored 18 points along with two steals. Now that he won't be playing on Friday, will it be that much easier for St. Paul Lutheran to walk away with another win? Check MaxPreps.com after the match to find out.
