By David Rogers. BOONE, N.C. — There was a lot of “good” and hardly any “bad” — but it is hard to dismiss the “ugly” in the Watauga men’s basketball Northwestern Conference tournament championship win on Feb. 23, 63-56, over Alexander Central.
One onlooker among the standing room only, jam-packed Lentz Eggers Gym opined afterward, “That was some of the best high school basketball and some of the worst high school basketball by a single team in the same game.”
The Good
As junior point guard Maddox Greene told High Country Sports after the game, “We wanted to come out strong. Put the pedal to the metal, so to speak.”
And they did.
With 1:34 to go in the first quarter, the Pioneers led the visiting Cougars, 25-4. Watauga’s punishing defense had Alexander Central suffering a more than five-minute scoring drought. Meanwhile, the Pioneers were running their up-tempo, transition offense to near perfection.
By halftime, Watauga established a daunting, 37-16 lead. At the end of the third quarter, the Pioneers were ahead, 51-31, appearing to be running away with the result.
The Ugly
But then, the wheels of the all but assumed victory wagon started squeaking, perhaps even howling. The Pioneers got cocky and complacent. In short, they grew careless and the Alexander Central quintet took advantage.
Instead of playing “keep away” and burn time off the clock to protect the 20-point lead, the Pioneers put up some reckless shots from behind the arc (that did not go in) and lost possession, numerous times. With a couple of minutes left to play, Alexander Central had shrunk the deficit to just seven points and the packed Cougar stands behind their favorite sons’ bench started whispering, “Can we possibly pull off this unlikely, come-from-behind thriller?”
Fortunately for the Pioneers, there were some big shots that finally went in to keep the lead at around 10 points and with time winding down, Alexander Central was forced to foul. Almost all of those trips to the charity stripe were by Greene, who finished the night making 7-of-10 free throw attempts, accounting for a good chunk of his 17 points. And it was those calmly made free throws that proved the final dagger for the Cougars.
In one fourth quarter timeout, Pioneer head coach Payne said he told his guys, “Just settle down and finish this with good decisions.”
Pioneer senior guard Wyatt Kohout shot 50 percent from beyond the arc (5-of-10 attempts), on his way to a game-high 19 points. Forward Jackson Pryor recorded a double-double, with 14 points to go along with 10 rebounds. Kohout and Pryor were both named to the all-tournament team, Greene garnered tournament MVP honors.
Few in the building will forget Watauga’s dominating, “statement” lead through three quarters of play. They may or may not remember the near collapse in the fourth quarter.
Payne said he was proud of the team’s ability to cope with adversity, even if some of it was self-inflicted. He noted that several of the guys have been with the program in its rebuilding phase and are now seeing the fruits of their labors. Long time coach and athletic administrator in the region, Marc Payne, stated that Watauga’s 21 wins this season is a program record and that this was the second Northwestern Conference tournament championship for the Pioneers in program history. The first, according to longtime WATA radio announcer Mike Kelly, now retired, came in 1971-72.
The Pioneers now await the Feb. 24 release of the North Carolina 4A State Playoffs pairings. As the No. team in the Northwestern Conference, they are assured of at least a fairly high seed and a first round home game on Tuesday. That will take place after Watauga women’s first round home game, the guys probably to start at 7:30 p.m. or 8 p.m.
