Staff photo by Steve Muscatello Springfield’s Isaac Fink takes a shot as Minnesota Valley Lutheran’s Dunwa Omot defends on the play during the first half Friday in Springfield. Fink scored his 2,000 career point during the Tigers win. For more photos of this event go to cu.nujournal.com

SPRINGFIELD — Not even the flu could stop Isaac Fink from reaching a milestone at home on Friday night.

The Springfield junior, who battled the flu earlier in the week, fought off the virus to score 41 points against Minnesota Valley Lutheran on Friday. He also scored his 2,000th career point in the process as the Tigers ran away with a 103-82 Tomahawk Conference boys’ basketball win.

Fink is the first player in school history to surpass 2,000 career points. He needed 39 points going into Friday’s game and the odds certainly weren’t in his favor heading into the contest. But he was determined to do whatever it took to get it in front of the home fans.

“It was a goal coming into the year to get it at home, because 1,000 [career points] was away,” Fink said. “Honestly, coming into this game, I just wanted to win and I wanted to do whatever we had to do to win. My teammates did a great job and it really goes out to them, all the teammates I’ve had throughout these four years, they’re unselfish and it shows a lot. This is for them, more than anything.”

Fink finished the game with 41 points and nine rebounds. He reached the milestone when he hit two free throws late in the game with 3:42 left, giving his team a 91-67 lead. The game was stopped and he was met by hugs from his teammates, one of the first being from senior Tanner Vogel, who is also a four-year starter with Fink.

Vogel finished the game with 21 points, 11 rebounds and seven assists.

While the final score indicated a convincing win for Springfield, it was far from that. In fact, MVL led 54-49 on a Jace Marotz basket with 14:52 left in the second half and it looked like it was going to be a back-and-forth battle between the two Tomahawk Conference heavyweights.

However, that soon changed as MVL’s Jake Kettner picked up his fourth foul and had to sit for four minutes. That shifted the momentum quickly as Springfield went on an 18-4 run before Kettner returned. That stretch enabled Springfield to take a 67-56 lead and the Tigers never looked back.

“At that point, when he went out, that’s when we needed to make our run and we knew it,” Fink said. “He’s one of the best players I’ve ever played against, it was a close game all the way until he went out and we needed to take over at that point.”

MVL coach Craig Morgan said that the Tigers are a difficult team to stop.

“You have to play your best game and you can’t lose focus,” Morgan said. “Every possession, you gotta know where you’re going and what you gotta do. We lost focus there and we couldn’t get a timeout in [during the Tigers’ run].”

Fink scored the first 9 points for the Tigers as they led 9-6. But MVL matched them offensively and the Chargers even slowed Fink down for a bit, keeping him scoreless for almost 7 minutes.

While Fink was on his game, Kettner was also on his as the two traded highlight baskets throughout the game. Kettner finished the contest with 20 points, eight assists and six rebounds.

The Tigers led 45-42 at halftime, but MVL went on an 8-0 run to start the second half and led 50-45. However, the momentum changed once Kettner was in foul trouble.

Minnesota Valley Lutheran’s record slipped to 9-5 overall and 6-2 in the Tomahawk. The Chargers host Wabasso on Tuesday and are at St. Clair on Friday.

Matt Munsen scored 17 points and had seven steals for the Chargers. Marotz had 15 points, five rebounds and five assists and Mason Cox had 10 points and six rebounds.

For the Tigers, Nolan Hovland had 10 points while Decker Scheffler and Mitchell Buerkle each scored 8 points. Scheffler also had 14 rebounds and Buerkle had nine rebounds. The Tigers finished with 60 rebounds in the game.

The win was big for Springfield because the Tigers (12-1, 8-0) have big games at Cedar Mountain/Comfrey on Tuesday and at New Ulm Cathedral on Friday before hosting Cleveland next Saturday. All three games are big games for the Section 2A standings.

“When our crowd is loud, we feed off that, they make a huge difference for us,” Vogel said. “We just gotta keep working hard in practice and keep getting better every game.”