By the time you read this, basketball season for some Garland County teams may be over, grinding to a halt in a district tournament at some distant location.
I can understand schools hanging banners to commemorate state and regional championships, even those at the district level. But what coach is bringing up at contract time a district runner-up finish or conference co-championship? That depends upon what expectations a coach is made to feel, I guess.
Some coaches need the safety net provided by a season record heavy on wins and light on losses. With a modicum of talent available, a 20-win season can be scheduled. Every school's trophy case brims with hardware from obscure tournaments in December and January. To get a clearer picture, check that school's record in February after district and regional tournaments. The really good teams consider any season unsuccessful that doesn't end in March.
I remember a former local coach saying after his team's early exit from the state tournament, "We need to get into a better (regular-season) tournament next year." He did, but it didn't produce a state title.
Even a strong team sometimes hits a snag against a quicker squad, one with taller players or that shoots really well.
District tournaments this week allow lower-rung teams one last chance to catch lightning and better teams to set their rotation, so to speak. Next week brings regional tournaments statewide, and don't be surprised if a ranked team catches the first train home. Regionals are watered down somewhat with consolation games (necessary for seeding teams at the state level), but more than one championship team has risen from the ashes of a regional defeat.
No future state champion looked more unlikely than the 1985-86 Mount Ida Lady Lions after losing in the regional final to Waldo at Caddo Hills. I would not have seeded them higher than sixth in the state tournament at Jonesboro. But with Terri Gaston playing the best basketball of her life (or that anyone may have ever seen in Montgomery County) and coach Glen Minton punching all the right buttons, the Lady Lions won it all.
The undefeated Jessieville varsity girls of 1987-88 had the misfortune to play Flippin in a state-tournament game that the north Arkansas school's top two scorers missed one shot between them. That team, with Garry Crowder coaching Nancy Castleberry, Tammy Oates, Lori Stephens and the rest of what I called the "Seven Wonders," is one of the very best from Garland County not to win a state title in the last 40 years.
Sometimes, a superior team is challenged when the breaks go against it or the intangibles are on the other side. Caddo Hills' magnificent varsity boys of 1989-90 received such a test in the Class A semifinals at Perryville.
With star player Chris Jones (a future Mountain Pine coach) ailing, the Indians came close to a season-ending defeat when a Delta player launched a deep shot at the buzzer. As Delta (and future Caddo Hills) coach Bill Taylor remembers, the ball went halfway into the basket and spun out. Thus reprieved, and still undefeated, Caddo Hills downed Crawfordsville for the championship the following night.
A Charleston shot at game's end stayed in the basket one night and sent a good Jessieville team home from the state tournament at Centerpoint. A closer look revealed that it was the only basket that night for the Charleston player. So apprised, the Charleston coach said, "He's a senior and he's supposed to take that shot." Wonderful stuff, unless you were a Jessieville fan.
Eddie Lamb, now at Lakeside, was the losing coach that night. But in another year, the Lamb-coached Lions beat Altheimer in triple overtime at White County Central near Judsonia. Milling through the crowd after that all-timer, I spotted Lamb and the father of Adam Hall, that team's dynamic long-range shooter, and commented, "You had 'em all the way."
In the season that I rediscovered high school basketball, something tells me that these are interesting times and that what we are about to see something good. As the late Terry Wallace would say before an Oaklawn season, everybody get tied down.
Sports on 02/12/2019