On Jan. 24, the New Ulm Eagles boys basketball team lost 88-70 to St. Peter.

The loss dropped the young Eagles’ squad to 3-13.

But since that Big South Conference loss to the Saints, the following things have occurred.

No. 1. New Ulm has gone 6-1 in its last seven games to improve to 9-14 on the year.

No. 2. The Eagles avenged a 78-66 road loss to Worthington with a 67-58 home win over the Trojans.

No. 3 New Ulm also avenged a 92-86 home loss to Belle Plaine by scoring a season-high 103 points in a 103-93 overtime win over the 15-7 Tigers Monday night.

No. 4. In the last seven games, New Ulm has averaged 83 points per game, including scoring 97 against TCU before scoring 103 Monday. In their last two games, the Eagles have averaged 100 points.

“Team play has been the story for us in the last seven games,” New Ulm head coach Matt Dennis said. “We have seen big strides in team defense and team play. We have seen big strides in both areas.”

After the earlier loss to Belle Plaine, Coach Dennis said that despite the loss, he was seeing positive steps being taken by his team.

“We have now had some nice wins lately over some really god teams,” he said. “We flipped the Belle Plaine win — they took us double overtime and stole that game at our place — and then we won in overtime at their place. That is a sign of progress with a young group. We got an 86-82 win over Jordan (14-8) — they are a very strong team so that was an accomplishment. Going up to beat 3A Willmar was a big win. We are making that progress and trying to go 1-0 each night and take care of business — it has been steady progress.

“When we were 3-13, it is hard for people to necessarily see the progress because a lot of people focus on those cumulative wins and losses. But with a young team, you need to look a little deeper and see the assist, turnovers and rebounding numbers. When you start putting those together, the results become clear — but it just does not happen. These players have made it happen — they love basketball.”

Coach Dennis said that the 83 ppg average in the last seven games is a case of players on the team finding each other.

“We have people stepping up and knocking down shots,” coach Dennis said. “The last few nights [sophomores] Mitchell and Levi Hopp — Levi had 40 against TCU and Mitchell had 32 [Monday] against Belle Plaine. Zach Hubbard [junior] has had huge nights for us — he has been much more aggressive — and Joey Wise [sophomore] has scored in double-digits and Friday, Brady Dennis [a junior] was in double-digits.”

Coach Dennis said that his team has gotten huge defensive play from senior Dain Barie.

“If you are not really watching and don’t notice, he is a pest to the other team on defense,” coach Dennis said. “He is trying to draw charges on the other teams best player — he is putting us in a position to win. We recognize it, but it is one of those little things that a lot of people don’t pay attention to. But we do. He wants to do whatever it takes to win.

Coach Dennis said that his team is still young outside of aging three months. “But in those three months, we have grown more than three months and that is evident in the stretch that we are on,” he said. “We have shown growth down the stretch at the end of games where earlier in the season we did not have that poise at the end of the game and we are developing that. We are gaing confidence each game — when you score 103 in a game and 97 in the game before. We joked as coaching staff after Monday’s game that over our last two games we are averaging 100 points.”

Coach Dennis said that in the win over Belle Plaine, Levi Hopp guarded the Tigers’ Ethan Martens, who ended with 14 points.

“Martens scored 50 a week ago and in an overtime game we held him to 14 points,” coach Dennis said. “And we had Nick Risen hit two big 3s for us — he is our most cerebal player — he knows where the ball is supposed to go.”

New Ulm heads to Redwood Valley Thursday to take on the 16-9 Cardinals.

“We want to go 1-0 Thursday — we need to play defense and attack their defense,” coach Dennis said. “We are a team and we need to play that way. We are happy with who, what and where we are right now. I love the progress of this young team.”