SPORTS
Longhorns break nine year drought with playoff win
The Forestburg Longhorns won their first playoff game in nine years by beating Newcastle on Tuesday night.
The Longhorns won 53-46 against the Bobcats in a close and emotional game before losing in the area round to Dodd City on Thursday night 61-26.
Forestburg came into the playoffs in a bit of a funk. With second place wrapped up in the district standings, the Longhorns had lost their three previous games, with the most recent two being close heartbreakers.
Newcastle was a shorter and athletic team that was led by an electric point guard Isaac King who seemed to score on any transition opportunity.
Forestburg had the size advantage and seemed to handle Newcastle’s press defense the majority of the time.
The Longhorns wanted to slow it down and play inside out, using their size advantage in the post or finding openings in the mid-range against the Bobcats zone defense.
Forestburg led 15-13 after the first quarter, with Newcastle being carried by King who scored 11 of his team’s points. He had to sit for long stretches in the middle quarters due to foul trouble and the Longhorns took advantage.
Forestburg led 25-19 at halftime and got out to a double-digit lead in the third quarter despite key post player Kyler Willett sitting with his own foul trouble.
Leading scorer Jesus Sanchez put an exclamation point on his team’s momentum by sinking a half-court buzzer beater heading into the fourth quarter, putting the Longhorns up 41-30.
Newcastle picked up the intensity on its press and started to create some turnovers. Forestburg was trying to run some clock at the same time, but the Bobcats picked up momentum and started closing the gap.
Newcastle cut it to two points, down 48-46 in the final two minutes. The Bobcats had an opportunity to tie the game following a steal, laying the ball up with 1:25 left in the game.
However, the basket was wiped away as the player was called for traveling.
Newcastle had one more opportunity to tie the game in the final minute, but Forestburg’s Angel Cruz stole the ball away and threw the ball ahead to Sanchez who was fouled following his layup. He made the free throw to complete the 3-point play and clinch the game.
Forestburg scored one more basket at the very end to make the final score 53-46.
The playoff win was the first for the Forestburg boy’s basketball program since 2015.
The Longhorns did not have much time to bask in the win as they played the ninth ranked team in the state in 1A Dodd City on Thursday night.
Unfortunately, it was not a close game.
Forestburg had trouble scoring all game, only scoring in double-figures in the fourth quarter.
The Hornets were raining 3-pointers early on and led 29-12 at halftime. With Dodd City then scoring 24 points in the third quarter, the game was out of reach.
Forestburg did outscore the Hornets in the fourth quarter, but the lead was too big as Dodd City won 61-26.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the weekend edition of the Bowie News.
Prairie Valley
The Prairie Valley Bulldogs had a good final non-district warm-up on Friday at home against Ector.
The Eagles beat the Bulldogs 69-63 in a game where Prairie Valley was trying to play catch up all the way through.
The Bulldogs were coming off a tough tournament at Electra the previous week to try and knock the holiday rust off. Prairie Valley was familiar with Ector, having played the team to start its season back in early November and was hoping to compete better than it did in that first game.
The Eagles came out firing, splashing five 3-pointers, including several deep ones, to go out to a 21-8 lead in the first quarter. Even with the Bulldogs changing out of their preferred zone defense, the 3-pointers continued a bit and opened things up inside the arc.
Thankfully, Prairie Valley’s offense came alive in the second quarter, scoring 18 points and cutting the lead down to 38-26 at halftime.
The third quarter was more of the same, though a different player for Ector started to get hot from beyond the arc. Even as the Bulldogs were able to keep up their offensive production from the second quarter, they could not break through and cut the game to single-digits, trailing 54-42 heading into the final period.
The fourth quarter saw Prairie Valley break through to cut it the lead to single-digits, but just not close enough. Every time the Bulldogs were on the cusp of making it a one or two basket game, the Eagles would make a shot to keep that distance.
In the end, the final score was the closest Prairie Valley got as Ector won 69-63.
Nocona
The Nocona Indians bounced back with a competitive district win at Petrolia on Friday.
The Indians won 60-53 against the Pirates in a game where the middle quarters took drastic swings in momentum.
Nocona was coming off its first district loss against Windthorst as the team sat a 1-1 district record.
Petrolia came into the game at 0-1, but had a bit more time to prepare for the game.
The first quarter was competitive, but the Indians were able to get to the free throw line at will and led 16-11.
Then Nocona’s pressure defense turned up its intensity in the second quarter.
“Our pressure seemed to disrupt them and we were able to get out in transition after forcing turnovers,” Coach Brody Wilson said.
Nocona scored 25 points and led 41-25 at halftime.
Unfortunately, that intensity did not keep up at the start of the third quarter for Nocona.
The Indians took their foot off the gas a little bit which allowed Petrolia’s offense to get back into the game and make up some of the deficit.
The Pirates outscored Nocona 15-7 and trailed only 48-40 heading into the final period.
Thankfully, the Indians bounced back and competed a bit better in the fourth quarter. Nocona was able to keep offensive pace to keep Petrolia at a bit of a distance instead of making it a one score game.
The Indians held on to win 60-53.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the weekly Bowie News.
For more pictures from the Prairie Valley game, click here https://www.dotphoto.com/go.asp?l=bnews1&AID=6871971&T=1
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