Lions fall to Apaches in first round of regional tourney
WEST FORK —The Gravette Lions boys’ basketball team had its hands full Feb. 22 as it traveled to West Fork to participate in the 4A North regional basketball tournament. The Lions needed the win to earn an automatic berth in the state 4A playoffs. One obstacle stood in the way, the Pottsville Apaches, a team from a small town near Russellville.
The Apaches quickly established their dominance. They left the Lions in their wake, running up a 20-7 lead by the end of the first quarter. The Lions shut down Pottsville’s offense for most of the second quarter but were unable to capitalize on the boards, and the Apaches’ lead grew to 16 points going into the halftime break.
The Lions managed to hold Pottsville’s offense to eight points early in the third quarter. But, as was the case in the second quarter, Gravette was unable to get its offense working. The Lions went into the final eight minutes of the contest down by 14.
Pottsville continued to control the pace and maintained a 16-point lead early in the fourth quarter. That changed at the 4-minute mark when the Li- ons mounted a comeback, pumping in two-pointers on almost every possession. Pottsville was able to match Gravette, point for point, not allowing the Lions to gain any ground on the scoreboard. With 50 seconds left, Gravette’s Andrew Miller hit a field goal to pull the Lions within eight.
Two missed free throws and a turnover gave the Apaches a 66-54 advantage with less than 30 seconds left in the contest. A free throw by Austin O’Brien with 15 seconds left, moved Gravette to within 11. O’Brien came back a few seconds later and hit a three-pointer to bring Gravette to within eight before time ran out. Pottsville took the victory 66-58 and advanced to the next round of the tournament.
“We got down early in the contest,” said Matt Busch, Gravette boys’ basketball coach. “I thought we fought back and played very hard toward the end of the game. We cut it to eight twice, but we couldn’t get over the hump.”
For the Gravette Lions, the season turned out to be a remarkable effort for those involved in the program, including Busch.
“I was pleased with the way my first season went,” Busch said. “We finished the season 21-8 overall and were conference runnerup, and that was the good part of this season. I think we set the standard for how our culture should be inside the basketball program.”
Leading the scoring for the Lions was Kelton Trembly with 15, followed by Dayten Wishon with 11. Andrew Miller scored 9, Seth Duke and Austin O’Brien had 6 each. Chris Childress rounded out the scoring effort, contributing 4 points.