Arkansas high school boys basketball state tournament: Springdale avoids upset against Little Rock Southwest
NORTH LITTLE ROCK — Little Rock Southwest gave Springdale all it could handle before falling 61-57 in the first round of the Class 6A State Tournament at Charging Wildcat Arena on the campus of North Little Rock Tuesday night.
The Gryphons (6-18), a fourth-year program, had a chance to win the game late when Jonathan Taylor’s three-point attempt was off the mark. Springdale got the rebound and Jarvis Palmer scored as the clock ran down to set the final margin.
Trailing 59-57, the Gryphons got their chance to tie or take the lead after Palmer missed two free throws with 23.1 seconds left. Initially, they got the ball to senior James DeLoach, who scored 23 points, but he passed out to Taylor in the left corner, who did not score all night.
“Like I told him, it’s nice to get the ball into Deloach,” said Southwest coach Chris Threat. “I didn’t complain when he made that three against Cabot to win the game in double overtime. I’m not going to get picky with a senior. He’s capable, it just didn’t fall tonight.”
Springdale head coach Jeremy Price acknowledged that this time of the year, style points don’t matter, but knows his team is going to need to play a lot better when it meets Little Rock Central at 8:30 p.m. on Thursday.
“It was closer than we wanted it be,” said Price. “Give credit to Southwest, they are a tough team. Every time we stretched the lead out, they come back. It’s tournament time, it’s survive and advance and I think we did that.”
The Bulldogs (19-11) led 21-12 after the first quarter and were up 27-14 midway through the second quarter before the Gryphons rallied back with Brayden Green making a three-pointer at the buzzer to close it to 29-25 at halftime.
The game was nicp and tuck in the second half with Springdale leading 44-41 going into the fourth quarter. The Gryphons closed to 53-51with less than three minutes to play on a basket by Montrell Martin, who had 17 points. After Holden Plant made two free throws with 2:36 left to make it 55-51, DeLoach and Johnathan Hudson scored to tie it at 55. Isaiah Sealy scored to put the Bulldogs up 57-55 with 1:15 left. After running the shot clock down to 10 seconds, Threatt called timeout with 50 seconds left and Sealy came up with a steal and converted to make it 59-55 before DeLoach scored to make it 59-57.
Making the state tournament for the first time in school history, Threat was proud of the way his team played, but wants the underclassmen to know what the pain of losing in the state tournament feels like so they can grow from it.
Price gave Southwest credit for their effort.
“They’ve been playing really well,” said Price. “They’re played teams in their conference close. We knew we’d have a fight. We were missing our execution tonight. We were not making the right play enough. It forced us to play basketball, but we didn’t do that enough.”
Sealy and Brayden Sims finished with 16 points for the Bulldogs. Palmer had 14 and Plant had 10 points.
JONESBORO 50, BENTONVILLE 47
The defending Class 6A state champions get to live to see another day.
Jonesboro (16-13), overcame a fourth quarter in which it didn’t score a point until the 33 seconds left in the game, to beat Bentonville (15-16) 50-47 Tuesday at Charging Wildcat Arena.
“I don’t know what the key was. Our guys played really hard,” said Jonesboro head coach Wes Swift. “Our goal was to wear down No. 11 (Jayvn Williams) and I thought we did that because by the time the fourth quarter rolled around, he was breathing pretty hard.”
The Hurricane will meet Springdale Har-Ber at 5:30 p.m. Thursday in the quarterfinals.
The Hurricane, who led 45-36 after three quarters, saw their lead get trimmed to one when Jayvn Williams, made two free throws with 59.0 seconds left to close it to 45-44.
Jonesboro broke the drought when C.J. Larry scored with 33 seconds left to make it 47-44.
Bentonville had a chance to set up a game-tying three-pointer, but Larry came up with a steal with 15.9 seconds left. Chris Stacy made one of two at the line to make it 48-44 and Stacy had a layup as time expired to set the final margin.
“We won it on the defensive end which is what Jonesboro has done for a long time,” said Swift. “He (Larry) got the strip because the guy on the ball did his job.”
Jonesboro used a 10-0 run late in the third quarter to take a 45-36 into the fourth quarter.
Swift said his team started getting timid on offense and said after the four-minute mark, he was trying to run the shot clock under 15 seconds before getting a good shot but didn’t execute the plan very well.
Stacy led Jonesboro with 23 points. Larry had 14 points. Elijah Wilhelm had 14 points for Bentonville. Williams had 10.
After winning state titles in 5A and 6A the past two years, the Hurricane have had a season that has been a struggle, but Swift expects his team to rise to the occasion in the state tournament.
“You expect to win,” Swift said. “Nobody’s expecting not to win. We expect to have a second-round match with Har-Ber. We knew this one was going to be tough. It’s our job to get ready for the most explosive backcourt in the state.”
--Jeff Halpern | @SBLiveAR
