Bruns brothers back together on the court

Paul and Isaac Bruns are brothers on the Division I basketball team that plays its home games a half-hour from where they grew up. You could ride your bicycle from USD’s home court to their real home court if you really wanted some exercise.

It’s an idyllic situation that in some ways sounds like it came out of a movie. They get along very well at USD and they are productive players who like the idea that they can go home for an afternoon and see the rest of the family.

They share a love of competition that benefits the program and, looking back over the years, has helped them become effective players at this level. They have also enjoyed competing against each other in all the stuff that comes with loving sports and having a brother within a few years of the same age.

Paul, a 6-4 junior starter, is averaging 27 minutes and 10 points a game. Isaac, a 6-4 freshman, is averaging 13.8 minutes and 6.3 points a game while coming off the bench.

Both were high school state Class A players of the year at Dakota Valley, where one or the other or both were starring for the Panthers for about half a decade.

“We’re pretty tight on and off the court,” Paul said. “Obviously, we’re pretty competitive in practice. A lot of times we’ll be guarding each other and it gets competitive but we’re just making each other better. This is a great team with great coaches and we’re having fun this year. We’ve had some ups and downs but we’re going to continue to get better and have fun the rest of the year.”

Both Bruns were dominating players at the high school level, graduating with Dakota Valley’s all-time scoring record. (Isaac now holds it at 2,309.) The younger Bruns was a three-time, first-team all-stater who was part of state titles his junior and senior seasons.

It’s hard to imagine a more successful high school career, especially given that the Panthers, whose standouts included Randy Rosenquist, Jr., the son of Coyote basketball legend Randy Rosenquist, didn’t lose a game Isaac’s junior or senior seasons. 

A year later he is a true freshman getting minutes that matter. 

“Obviously the competition is a lot better than when we were on the same team in high school,” Isaac said. “We took a lot of the shots, we were team leaders and we were on the court together all the time. We still are on the floor at the same time occasionally and it still feels good to get a good pass to the other and see it create a good shot but it’s definitely a little different.”

The pair were also fine high school golfers and they have been able to maintain a rivalry in that sense. Paul finished second at the 2020 South Dakota state Class A high school golf meet his senior season at Dakota Valley. 

Isaac will admit to not being quite as good as his older brother in that sport, but it’s clear the margin is not insurmountable, especially given that they’ll have a lot more time for golf when they’re not spending every spring, summer and fall lifting weights and playing basketball. 

“He’s pretty good around the greens,” Isaac said of his brother. “He gets up and down pretty well. I’d say that’s where he gains most of his strokes. I can beat him, though, once in a while. The last time we played I beat him by two strokes.”

Not that anybody is keeping track of that kind of thing, of course. Meanwhile, Paul is in complete agreement with his younger brother that he is a little better.

“Just look at our scores from high school,” he said. “He’ll beat me once in a while and I never hear the end of it, but it’s always fun.”

In the spring of 2020 the only place the Bruns could really play basketball was against each other on the family court. KCAU-TV stopped by one day during that virus-induced break from competitive basketball and did a story on the Bruns brothers staying sharp by playing one-on-one at the house.

For the story, the pair were asked to shoot around and act like they were playing each other to provide what TV people call “b-roll.” It is the video scene-setting that helps tell the stories. 

The Bruns mutually decided they would mail it in defensively because neither of them had warmed up. They would dribble around a little, put up a couple jumpers for the camera and call it a day.

This was before Isaac decided to drive around Paul for a layup and before Paul decided to end Isaac’s layup attempt with a block that sent the ball bouncing off the backboard toward the camera. 

“Isaac wasn’t too happy about that,” Paul said. “He thought we were just going to play token defense, but you know, you can’t let him off easy in that situation.”

It was news to Isaac at the time.

“What did Paul tell you about that?” he asked when the TV news incident came up. He then proceeded to offer his version of the events. 

“We had it figured out – he’d shoot a couple shots and I’d put a hand in his face to contest it,” Isaac continued. “We just wanted to make it look sort of realistic. Then I drive to the right and think I’m going to get a pretty easy layup because we agreed we weren’t going to go hard, right? Then he kicks it into gear and goes 100% for that one and swats me off the backboard. I know we were going well above 50% after that happened.”

The KCAU report included each complimenting the other on being able to continue playing basketball – albeit outside against just one other player – during the pandemic. They were, in a word, grateful they had the other around to share a passion for the sport. 

Four years later that hasn’t changed a bit.