Cyclones outlast Trojans, advance to 2nd round
Hot Springs’ run ended Tuesday.
The Trojans (13-14) put up a fight, but in the end, Russellville (21-6) sent the host team packing, much like the Cyclones’ season did last year when Jonesboro upset them as the host of the Class 5A state tournament.
“Normally I play more guys than what I did today, and that may have been what caused us to kind of, you know, wear down,” said Hot Springs head coach Antoni Lasker. “They didn’t play that many guys. I normally play 9-10 guys, and I don’t think I played that many tonight the amount of minutes that they normally get, and so you know, hats off to Russellville for their game plan. They took away our two best guys, and other guys stepped up at times, but when it when it mattered, we couldn’t make shots in the second half.”
The Trojans trailed 33-27 at the break, but a pair of free throws from senior J.J. Walker got them within 4 with 42 seconds off the clock. The two teams traded buckets until the Cyclones hit an 8-0 run to stretch out to a 45-33 lead with 4:17 left in the third quarter.
Hot Springs responded with a 9-0 run, led by junior Jabari West to cut Russellville’s lead down to 45-42 with 2:13 left. The Cyclones refused to lie down,
going on a 6-1 spurt to take a
51-43 lead into the final eight minutes.
“I’m very proud of our team and the way we responded,” Pennington said. “Each time they came, we kept responding. So just, I couldn’t be more proud of those guys in that locker room.”
The Cyclones’ kept the momentum, hitting a 9-point run over the first three minutes of the period to stretch out to a
17-point lead. Walker took the team on his back, adding the team’s next 7 points to pull within 62-50 with 3:16 left, but the lid closed on Hot Springs’ end of the court as Russellville ran out the clock to advance to Saturday’s second-round game.
“The final score was not an indication of that ballgame,” said Russellville head coach Kyle Pennington. “Coach Lasker and his team fought their tails off. We just spread it out there at the end, made them play that spread out zone. Got some layups, got some easy threes. That’s a good basketball team. Hats off to coach Lasker and the job he did right there. That’s a heck of a team.”
Lasker said his players took the loss pretty hard, but that is how they treat every loss.
“I always tell the guys, ‘I hate losing more than I like winning,’ and that’s kind of our DNA as a program and as a team,” Lasker said. “We win; we feel like that’s what we that’s what we’re supposed to do. When we lose, we take it hard; we do. But we have to, you know, when the next game comes, we have to move on. But, you know, when you lose the last game of the season, you know, for those seniors, they know that that’s the last time that they’re gonna get to put on that jersey. And it does hit a little different when it’s the last game.
The Trojans got on the scoreboard first as West found senior Adrian Conway for a bucket just 30 seconds into the game, but Russellville quickly took charge, hitting a 12-2 run for an 8-point lead with 2:13 left in the quarter. The Trojans battled back on a 9-3 spurt to pull within 15-13 at the end of the period.
After a 3-pointer by junior Grayson Sims and a putback by Renard Allen, the Cyclones were back up by 7, but Hot Springs’ younger players found their rhythm with sophomore Tavallis Stephens II finding classmate Nasir Hannah on the perimeter for a big trey en route to knotting the score at 20 with 5:51 left in the half.
“I believe we have a bright future,” Lasker said. “Those young guys — this is probably the smallest senior class that we’ve had since I’ve been here, even going back to my time as an assistant. Now we only have two seniors, and so now having a small senior class you know it kind of pushes other guys, i.e. our sophomores, into roles that they wouldn’t normally have to be put in.”
Sims hit a 3-pointer to put some distance between the two teams, but Hannah hit a free throw before Stephens II hit a trey of his hos to take a single-point lead. That was the last lead the Trojans had, drawing the score once more at 27 with 1:22 left before Russellville closed the half on a 6-point spurt.
“You know, everybody wants to talk about the 5A-West, and they just keep getting swept and this team was on a mission tonight,” Pennington said. “So I’m very proud of them for for not only representing Russellville but representing our conference because in the last two years, the 5A-West has been swept. And so we’re excited about about where we’re headed.”
Junior Donyae May led the Cyclones with 20 points, four rebounds and two assists, and Allen also finished with 20 points, six rebounds, four assists, a steal and a block. Sims finished with 18 points, all from behind the arc, a rebound and an assist.
Walker led the Trojans with 14 points, six rebounds and an assist. Stephens II added 10 points, two rebounds and an assist, Hannah had 9 points and two assists, West put up 9 points with 14 rebounds, four blocks and an assist, and Aamir Andrews added 8 points.
The Cyclones will play at 1 p.m. Saturday against the winner of Thursday’s game between Marion and Maumelle.