Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
River Valley report Baby, win make for a full day
HECTOR — The look on Mansfield Lady Tigers coach Ethan Bowman’s face on Wednesday afternoon told the story; tired but happy.
Bowman’s wife, Mallory, gave birth to a healthy baby, Brooks, at 4:08 that morning and Bowman had been up about 32 hours when his Lady Tigers took the floor for the opener of the Class 2A West Regional Tournament at Hector.
“I’m exhausted,” Bowman said following his team’s 60-49 win over Ozark Mountain.
“I don’t see any time in the future that I can actually rest. It’s that time of the year in the basketball season, and me and my wife are blessed with a baby early this morning. We’re very blessed.”
Bowman didn’t have time to relax during the victory that afternoon either. Despite being the top seed from the 2A-4, the Lady Tigers had a short-lived comfortable lead.
“This is always the scary game,” Bowman said. “You have to win this one to qualify for state. We don’t try to put too much focus into that, we’re just focused on winning the next game one game at a time.”
Mansfield (26-3) held Ozark Mountain to just one field goal in its first 14 shots and led 17-3 seven minutes in with Allison Edwards scoring six points with a free throw, a basket inside and a layup off a steal. Kynsley Ward and Natalie Allison added treys for the Lady Tigers in the early going.
In the second quarter, Mansfield held a 20-14 advantage and led 37-20 at the half with 6-3 freshman forward Kaylee Ward scoring three baskets off offensive rebounds, adding a free after the third one to complete a three-point play.
“We played really good basketball in the first half, really good basketball,” Bowman said. “We had a comfortable lead. Second half, we can complain about the referees but we didn’t control what we could control. We turned the ball over too much, we didn’t make free throws, we weren’t poised and under control like we were in the first half. That’s all stuff we can control, and we didn’t do a good job of that. That allowed Ozark Mountain to still be within reach.”
Mansfield was outscored each of the two second-half quarters, and Kaylee Ward fouled out with 6:39 left after scoring 11 points and grabbing 12 rebounds.
Mansfield led 46-25 before Ozark Mountain whittled it down to 50-43 with 3:38 left in the game. Senior Seven Sanderson scored five-straight points, and the Lady Tigers escaped the first round intact. “At the end of the day, we finished,” Bowman said. “A win’s a win.”
Mansfield will play in the second round on Friday at 4 p.m. against the winner of Thursday’s first round game between Life Way Christian and Lavaca.
LAVACA Champs return
The reigning Class 2A state champions will return to the state tournament.
After a 9-9 first-quarter tie, the Golden Arrows cruised to a 62-26 win over Eureka Springs on Wednesday in the opening round of the Class 2A West Region Tournament. The win assures Lavaca of a berth in the Class 2A state tournament next week in Rector.
“It’s the only game that I get a little nervous about,” Lavaca coach Renner Reed said. “Everybody wants to make it to state, you’re the one seed, you’re the defending champs. This team actually beat us last year in the regional finals, and they had three starters back. We wanted it. The guys wanted it. It was a very serious walk around and shoot around earlier. It’s good to get it off our chest, kind of breathe and move on to the next one.”
Eureka Springs was the last team to beat Lavaca in the post-season, winning, 64-55, in the championship game of the Class 2A West Region last year at Eureka Springs. The Highlanders outscored Lavaca by a 4024 count over the final 15 minutes.
Dylan Johnson and Shane Holloway led that victory with 26 and 14 points, respectively. Johnson is the school record holder in 3-pointers for a career, a season and a game. He scored 57 points three weeks ago in an 88-51 win over Rogers Haas Hall. In a 65-53 win over Life Way Christian in December, Johnson scored 45 points.
“He scored 57 in a game this year,” Reed said. “He hurt us last year when we played them in the regional finals so we really keyed in on those two guys. Team defense overall, our guys really busted it out there.”
Lavaca limited Johnson to just two treys and 16 points, and the 6-11 Holloway managed just one basket before fouling out in the third quarter.
“We knew they were going to go to him,” Reed said. “That’s their advantage, I mean, he’s 6-11. You can’t practice against it. I’ve seen a lot of team double him as the ball came down. It worked at times. We didn’t want him to get going. We wanted to frustrate him so we pressured their guards really hard.”
Lavaca will play Friday at 5:30 p.m. against the first-round winner between Ozark Mountain and Mansfield.
VAN BUREN Down to one game
The Pointers knew this week would be the key to their post-season opportunities, and now it’s down to a single game on Friday night.
Van Buren hosts Russellville for the final night of the regular season. The winner earns a berth in next week’s Class 5A state tournament at the Pine Bluff Convention Center.
Van Buren (17-12, 8-5) is currently behind Siloam Springs (18-9, 10-3) and Harrison (19-9, 9-4), which play on Friday at Harrison. The Pointers can even earn the No. 2 seed with a win on Friday and a loss by Harrison because of the head-to-head tie-breaker advantage.
Tuesday, Van Buren scored 17 points in the fourth quarter but it wasn’t enough to wipe out a big deficit in a 53-39 loss at Siloam Springs, which led 20-6 after a quarter and 31-14 at the half.
Greenbrier, Mountain Home and Russellville all sit at 7-6 in the conference and are still alive in the hunt for seeds three and four.
NORTHSIDE Finishes on the road
The Lady Bears will try to rebound from Tuesday’s 44-42 loss at home to Bentonville with a trip to Springdale on Friday for the final night of 6A-West play.
Northside (22-5, 12-3) and Springdale Har-Ber (18-8, 12-3) are currently tied for second in the conference a game behind Bentonville (24-6, 13-3) in the win column. Har-Ber travels to Bentonville West on Friday. Regardless of Friday’s outcomes, Bentonville holds the tie-breaker advantages over both Northside and Har-Ber and also in a threeway tie so the Lady Tigers will be the conference’s top seed in next week’s Class 6A state tournament at Rogers.
Northside can wrap up the No. 2 seed with a win at Springdale today.
The Lady Bears cruised past the Lady Bulldogs in the first meeting in January at Northside, winning, 67-38. Northside had a huge, 63-38, advantage on the boards.
The Grizzlies lost to Springdale, 49-48, in the first meeting between the two teams.
The Grizzlies will be the sixth seed from the conference in the state tournament and will play Tuesday, Feb. 28, at 8:30 p.m. against the third seed from the 6A-Central, which will be either Cabot or North Little Rock. The two teams met on Thursday night with the winner earning the third seed.
GREENWOOD
Lady Bulldogs look to perfection
The Lady Bulldogs have already secured the top seed in the Class 5A state tournament and won the outright 5A-West championship. All that awaits is a perfect 14-0 conference mark.
Greenwood (15-2, 13-0) concludes the conference slate with a trip to Mountain Home (16-14, 7-6). The Lady Bulldogs have won 42-straight conference games.
The Lady Bombers wrapped up a state tournament berth with a 78-39 win over Greenbrier on Tuesday. They hit a single-game school-record 17 3-pointers in the win.