Off to a 7-2 start, Highland could be the upstart team in the 6A District 4-5-6 conference

POCATELLO – The Madison boys basketball team has been the team to beat in the 6A District 4-5-6 conference.

Thunder Ridge and Rigby have been competitive.

And then there’s Highland.

Since the 2017-18 season, the Rams have not had a winning season.

Highland did make the state tournament in 2022-23 after finishing 14-14, and made a state play-in game the following year. But overall, the Rams have a combined record of 19-31 over the past two seasons, winning just eight games a year ago.

Is this the year the Rams make a run to the postseason?

“With this group, they’ve played with each other for quite awhile,” coach Matt Stucki said. “They had a good offseason where they put a lot of time in together. It’s a great group … they just play well together.”

The Rams enter the new year 7-2, and were one second away from matching their win total of a year ago before losing on a last-second basket by Post Falls in Saturday’s East Idaho Shootout Coast Guard Bracket final.

It was a heart-breaking loss to a Post Falls team that is ranked No. 3 in the latest state coaches’ poll. It also snapped a five-game win streak by Highland.

The Rams’ lineup is heavy with juniors and seniors, all of which have developed through the junior varsity ranks and played together on youth teams.

“I’ve been pretty excited about this group for awhile,” Stucki said.

Stucki noted that everyone on the team is able to shoot and that includes from 3-point range where the team is hitting around 45% of its shots, he said.

It’s an early sample size for sure, but the defense is also giving up less than 49 points per game, which is among the best in 6A.

In Saturday’s game, Raphael Njoku led the way with 14 points and Tracen Tripple added 13, but three other players also finished with eight points.

“Early in the season these are learning opportunities,” Stucki said. “Keeping a positive mentality that, yes this (loss) stinks, but there’s things we need to work on … We had some shots that could have made a difference, we made some mistakes, but we also did some good things. We’re going to learn from it and try to get better from it.”

Conference play starts Tuesday when the Rams head to Canyon Ridge.

Entering the new year, perennial conference power Madison is struggling at 2-7, while Thunder Ridge has been off to hot start at 8-2. Canyon Ridge (5-4) and Rigby (4-4) could also be challengers as the conference season plays out.

“Our conference is very competitive,” Stucki said. “We have good teams and it’s going to be a dog fight every night. Being in these games is really good for us to learn how to fight and how to win. And I suspect our conference play is going to get really tough. Our goal is to go to state and that’s the goal from the very beginning.”