Lights Go Out On Cardinals’ Season

FARMINGTON — The dream of qualifying for the State 4A boys basketball tournament Farmington hosts in March came to an end with a 52-35 loss to Berryville at district.

Berryville outscored Farmington 29-12 in the second half and held the Cardinals without a field goal for the final 9:55.

“You play good this time of year or you don’t keep playing,” said Farmington coach Beau Thompson. “Obviously, we didn’t play well tonight. They outplayed us in the third.

Farmington’s front line sat out much of the first half with foul trouble. Austin Shelley drew two fouls in the first 3:48 and went to the bench. By the 1:42 mark Devonte Donovan had his second and James Payne subbed in for him. The Cardinals led 11-7 at that juncture and went up 14-7 at the quarter break on Logan Landwehr’s 3-pointer. Berryville’s Weston Teague blocked a shot at the buzzer preventing Farmington from extending its lead.

In the second quarter, Teague towered over the Cardinals on the court and made his presence known. He had 5 points in the quarter helping fan a Bobcat comeback that also featured Trenton Hutchison’s trey and another by Chris Lehr matching a 3-pointer by Farmington’s Decory Thomas at the other end.

Berryville led briefly, 23-21, on Teague’s free throws, but Farmington blanked the Bobcats for the last 1:21 of the half. Thomas drove left-to-right across the lane to score tying the game, 23-23, at halftime.

The Bobcats scored twice to start the second half. Kade Davidson tipped an errant pass into the backcourt and caught up with it — making a layup. Landon Chester nailed a 3-pointer and the Bobcats were up 28-23. Farmington forced three straight turnovers and Thomas sank a 15-footer.

Thomas kept the Cardinals in the game with a 3-pointer, but Berryville built momentum midway through the third. J.D. Smith and Chester made back-to-back trifectas, the latter after a Teague blocked shot and the Bobcats led 36-28 with 2:23 showing.

Turnovers on Farmington’s last two possessions of the third contributed to a 42-31 deficit to start the fourth quarter. The Cardinals could not find the basket and were outscored 10-4 in the period.

Thompson felt his young squad over-achieved especially after losing his son, Logan Burch, in December. Burch provided stability at point- guard and forced defenses to play honest with the threat of his 3-point shooting.

“We had some great wins and to be honest we had a couple of bad losses,” Thompson said. “Tonight was one of those.”

BERRYVILLE 52, FARMINGTON 35

Berryville 7 16 19 10 — 52 Farmington 14 9 8 4 — 35 Berryville: (17-10, 4-7): Landon Chester 5 0-0 13, Kade Davidson 4 4-4 13, Weston Teague 2 5-8 9, Scotland Lucas 1 4-6 6, Chris Lehr 2 0-0 5, Trenton Hutchison 1 0-0 3, J.D. Smith 1 0-0 3. Totals 16 13-18 52. Farmington (11-6, 4-1): Logan Landwehr 4 0-0 10, DeCorey Thomas 4 0-0 10, Carson Simmons 2 1-4 5, Devonte Donavan 2 0-0 4, Nathan Monroe 0 3-4 3, Austin Shelley 1 0-0 2, Riley Funk 0 1-2 1, Noah Dishroon 0 0-2 0. Totals 13 5-12 35. 3-Point Goals — Farmington 4 (Landwehr 2, Thomas 2), Berryville 7 (Chester 3, Lehr, Davidson, Hutchison, Smith).