Photos by Chelsea Louthen
The Craig County boys made the Region 1C basketball tournament last week while the girls saw their season come to an end with a loss at Covington.
The top four teams in both the Pioneer and Mountain Empire Districts qualified for the region tournament. Craig teams both played in the “four-five” game in their respective district tournaments last week with the boys hosting Bath County while the girls played at Covington.
The girls saw their season end with a 55-28 loss to the Cougars. They finished at 1-16 on the year with a very young squad and hope to build on a strong jayvee team and some talented youthful players on this year’s varsity.
The boys played at home against Bath to open the district tournament and they qualified for the region with a 69-55 win over the Chargers. Matthew Lucas had 24 points to lead the Rockets and he also had nine rebounds. Zach Peters had 15 points and 10 assists, Hayden Reynolds nailed four three-pointers and finished with 14 points. Drew Duncan had eight points and Jaycob Wolfe had half a dozen in a team effort.
Craig had to come from behind to win. They were down five at the half and put 47 points on the board after intermission, their high point total for a half this season. They were 14 for 17 from the foul line in the fourth quarter as the Chargers fouled trying to catch up.
“This was a great team game,” said Craig coach Ryan Frazier. “The boys really played hard and battled to get the lead and keep it. I couldn,t be more proud of the team performance in our biggest game of the year.”
That put the Rockets in the next round against Narrows, the top seeded team in the Pioneer District. Craig battled the Green Wave but Narrows came out on top, 64-46. The Wave scored 50 points in the first half and opened a 35 point lead at intermission.
“We outscored them 31 to 14 in the second half but it wasn’t enough as we lost to the top seed in the district,” said Frazier.
Lucas had 17 points to lead the Rockets while Duncan had eight points and a dozen rebounds. Talon Ritter hit three three-pointers for nine points and Wolfe and Reynolds had six each.
Second place Parry McCluer beat Covington in the other district semifinal, 71-47, to set up a third place game between Craig County and Covington. The Cougars won that won, 75-60, and got the better seed for the region tournament with the win.
“I was very proud of the boys and how we never gave up in this game,” said Frazier. “ We were losing 61 to 37 at the end of the third quarter but we picked up the pace and scored 23 points in the fourth.”
The Rockets closed the lead to 11 at one point in the third second half but that was as close as they would come. Lucas finished with 19 points, nine boards and five assists while Wolfe had 18 points and four assists. Seth Parsons had eight points, including a couple threes, Wolfe had seven points and seven assists and Ritter hit two threes for six points.
Matthew finished with 19 points 9 reb amd 5 assists. Jayden finished with 18 pts.(5 3’s) and 4 ast. Seth Parsons scored 8 points including 2 3’s. Jaycob had 7 points and 7 assists. Talon scored 6 on 2 3’s.
With the loss the Rockets go into the Region 1C tournament as the fourth seed from the Pioneer, and that matched them up with the top seed from the Mountain Empire for Tuesday’s opening round. That was to be a challenge, as Mountain Empire top seed George Wythe was 23-2 and scheduled to host Craig.
“We didn’t have the year we expected but I am proud we still reached our goal of a regional berth for the second year in a row,” said Frazier