Basketball Game Preview: Harding County Ranchers vs. Belfield Bantams

The Harding County Ranchers are taking a road trip to take on the Belfield Bantams at 2:30 p.m. on Thursday. The teams are on pretty different trajectories at the moment (Harding County has five straight wins, Belfield has five straight defeats), but none of that matters once you're on the court.

If Harding County beats Belfield with 53 points on Thursday, it's going to be the team's new lucky number: they've won their past two matchups with that exact score. Harding County sure made it a nail-biter, but they managed to escape with a 53-50 victory over Bowman County co-op [Bowman/Scranton] two weeks ago. That's two games straight that the Ranchers have won by exactly three points.

Harding County relied on the efforts of Brayden Padden, who went 9 of 13 en route to 18 points along with eight boards and three blocks, and Bailey Rae Verhulst, who posted 11 points in addition to seven assists and seven steals. Those 18 points gave Padden a new career-high. The team also got some help courtesy of Macey Wendt, who put up eight points.

Meanwhile, Belfield had to suffer through a 60-19 loss at the hands of Garrison. While losing is never fun, the Bantams can't take it too hard given the team's big disadvantage in MaxPreps' North Dakota basketball rankings (they are ranked 93rd, while the Troopers are ranked 12th).

Harding County's win was their 13th straight at home dating back to last season, which pushed their record up to 5-0. The wins came thanks to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they averaged 66.7 points per game. As for Belfield, their loss dropped their record down to 1-5.