Ending their season with a Bi-District Championship, the Levelland Lobos fell to the Wichita Falls Hirschi Huskies, 4635, in the Area Championship round Friday night in Childress.
The Lobos opened the game playing their usual style of competitive defense allowing the Huskies to put together a 10-point opening quarter. The Lobos followed suit with nine points of their own to trail, 10-9.
Offensively, the Lobos struggled to find open shots and were forced to regroup during several possessions after trying to find success on the inside.
The Lobos managed five points in the second quarter to trial 20-14, at the half.
Levelland would bounce back offensively in the third quarter with a 12-point third quarter and cap off the fourth with a nine-point quarter.
While the Lobo defense remained competitive throughout the second half, continuing to be outscored after both quarters in the second half hurt Levelland’s chance of making a comeback in the later minutes of the fourth quarter.
The Huskies would begin to hold the ball and burn time forcing the Lobos to send Huskie players to the stripe by the middle of the fourth quarter.
Taeshaun Jones would lead the Lobos offense with 16 points while Eryk Jones managed 13 against the Huskies.
Carson Boggs wrapped up the game with four points while Jayden Castillo finished the game with two points.
The Lobos finished the game 12-45 from the field at 27 percent and went 5-16 from three-point range at 31 percent.
Hitting the hardwood as a Lobo for the final time in Childress were seniors: Ethan Campos, Zameron LeCroy, Jerry Haile, Konner Alexander, Ladarian Jordan, and T. Jones.
In the first season of the head coach, Parker Hicks led the Lobos season came to 17-16 overall record with a 4A Region 1 Bi-District Championship against the Graham Steers in the opening round of this year’s playoffs.
“I thought we played a very competitive game and I thought we did almost everything right,” said Coach Hicks. “When it comes the playoff, it’s going to fall on to the team who makes more shots, and they made more shots.”
Despite the lack of offensive production, Coach Hicks remains proud of his team for the effort they showed against the Huskies despite trailing the entire game.
“I’m really proud of this group,” said Coach Hicks. “The way our guys just fought and never really gave up even though we were down pretty much the whole game showed our competitive spirit.”
While Coach Hicks and his staff remained confident in their defensive power at home and away, they understood that Hirschi would bring that same type of mentality.
“Their defensive effort and ability to be physical is what makes them a great team and we saw them pride themselves on those aspects Friday night,” explained Coach Hicks. “We played well defensively, only giving up 46 points is what we want to do, but against the team like that you’re going have to score the ball and have to make shots.”
While the season comes to an end, a sense of culture and standard have been set thanks to a large group of seniors who will be walking the stage this May, “This season was really good to get our kind of culture and feet wet here at Levelland and we got to top it off with giving our seniors a gold ball,” said Coach Hicks. “Our underclassmen got a taste for what it’s like to win a playoff game.”
With the goal set at the beginning of the season to “Cut the net,” the Lobo program was able to achieve their goal during year one of a program haul. Coach Hicks has mentioned on several occasions the importance the entire program had of giving the seniors a taste of post season success.
“I was glad to send those seniors off right with a chance at playoff basketball to end their high school career here,” explained Coach Hicks. “Those guys are always going to be special to this program here because they’re the ones that started it and got it off the right foot. One day we can hopefully cut down a state championship net. These seniors will remember their time here because that’s who set the tone for the future.”
Coach Hicks will be looking to replenish his roster for next season as seven seniors will be graduating. Looking to carry the load heading into the off-season for the Lobos will be Eric Jones and Jayden Castillo who were pillars for the Lobos much of this season.
“With our seniors leaving all you can really ask if they did their job of preparing the underclassmen for the departure at the end of the season and I think they did,” said Coach Hicks. “With Eric and Jayden those guys got a lot of minutes playing in important games and understand what standards have now been set.”