ST. GEORGE — The Snow College men’s basketball team, whose roster includes two guards who played their high school careers in Southern Utah, recently won the school’s first region title in nearly a half century.
The Badgers defeated Southern Idaho 83-72 at Ephraim on Feb. 21 to clinch the regular-season Scenic West Athletic Conference championship. Then, in the finals of the Region 18 tournament in Price on March 2, Snow once again faced Southern Idaho, this time winning 76-69. It marked the Badgers’ first region championship since 1970, school athletic officials said.
Snow finished with a 9-3 record in conference play and currently has an overall record of 26-6. The Badgers, winners of their last seven games, are currently ranked No. 16 in the National Junior College Athletic Association Division I rankings.
Starting point guard Logan Hokanson, a 6-foot-0 sophomore who played high school basketball at Desert Hills, was the Badgers’ high scorer in the Feb. 21 game with 27 points on 8-of-14 field goal shooting, including 6-of-10 from 3-point range.
In 27 games this season, Hokanson has averaged 11.1 points, 2.7 rebounds, 3.4 assists and 1.3 steals per game, while averaging 25.6 minutes played.
Meanwhile, fellow guard Brantzen Blackner, a 6-foot-4 freshman who graduated from Canyon View High School in Cedar City in 2018, has also been a major contributor to the Badgers’ success this season.
Blackner has appeared in 25 games for the Badgers, averaging 8.7 points, 3.4 rebounds and 1.5 assists per game, in 19.5 minutes.
In a Jan. 26 home game against Salt Lake Community College, the Badgers rolled to a 108-88 win over the Bruins, with Blackner scoring 21 points on 7-of-8 shooting, including 6-of-7 from 3-point range. In that same game, Hokanson added 20 points on 7-of-10 shooting, including 4-of-6 treys.
In addition, last week, during the Region 18 tournament, Hokanson was named the Scenic West Athletic Conference’s player of the year.
Snow will travel to Yuma, Arizona, on Saturday to face Arizona Western in the District I championship game, which is scheduled to start at 7:30 p.m. and will be broadcast on the school’s YouTube channel (SnowTV). The winner travels to Hutchinson, Kansas, for the NJCAA National Basketball Championship, a 24-team tournament that starts March 18.
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