Around the Hardwoods with Wild Bill

by Bill Turner

The district tournaments are in full swing so it’s time to look at the key matchups which hopefully will crown champions among our area teams. Friday night (Feb. 18th) will offer some great games for the basketball junkie to check out. Pick your favorite and head out to the court!

In the Western Valley  District Patrick Henry survived a slow start to down Halifax County and the Patriots advance to play GW Danville in the title game Friday night at PH. This one should be good.

In the Blue Ridge, the title game is set for Friday night at Northside as the Vikings take on regular season champion Alleghany in a 6:00 p.m. tip-off. Can Billy Pope’s guys get the edge on Northside’s home court?

The River Ridge final will be played at 7:45 Friday at the Bast Center on the Roanoke College campus. At press time the teams were still undetermined with Hidden Valley, Cave Spring, Christiansburg and Salem in the hunt. I still say undefeated Christiansburg is ripe for an upset.

On the girl’s side, Patrick Henry survived the lottery ball drawing for tournament seeding and stunned regular season champ Halifax with authority Tuesday night. PH travels to Franklin County Friday night for the Western Valley title.

The Blue Ridge girls square off at Northside Friday night at 8:00 pm- Lord Botetourt and Byrd remained in contention heading  into Wednesday’s semifinals.

Salem will battle Pulaski County for the River Ridge trophy in a 6:00 pm start Friday night at the Bast Center in a preliminary to the boy’s championship.

This week we change the format a bit and, rather than the unusual game of the week, take a look at what has to be one of the strangest basketball playoff runs in state high school history. The date was February 25, 2008 when three Group C Division 1 teams saw their road to Richmond come to an abrupt, albeit predictable, halt.

Keeping in mind that high schools play the regular season schedule, the district tournament, the regionals, followed by the state final-8, and it’s quite a hill to climb to reach the elite final-four in Richmond in mid-March.

The winter of 2008 saw three girls teams, Holston, Pocahontas and Covington, battle through their regular season, compete in the district tournament and advance to the first round of the regionals. On that same February night in those regional games, Pocahontas lost by 40 points to Narrows, Holston fell by 20 to Galax, and Covington dropped their game to Bath County 42-39.

For all three teams this brought their season to an end. But their road to Richmond had more than its share of potholes. The final combined record of those three squads was 0-67. That’s right, all three advanced to the regional level without winning a single game all season. Pocahontas finished 0-23, with Holston and Covington 0-22.

Surely, an award was in order for both players and coaches alike for their sheer perseverance. And, this has to take the cake for the guys who always want to find a way to give everyone a trophy.

Now, to the mailbag where I’ll try to address numerous inquiries we have received over the last couple months about whether certain events qualify as ‘sports’.

Q: Women’s olympic curling? (Bob/Staunton)

A: Absolutely, all that leaning over qualifies.

Q: Texas Hold-em poker? (Vinny/Danville)

A: Sure. You can drink beer while you play.

Q: Men’s tag-team wrestling? (Maude/Salem)

A: No way–it’s all fake.

Q: Women’s tag-team wrestling? (Mark/Pulaski)

A: You bet it is!! See women’s curling, above.

Q: Cheerleading? (Wanda/Vinton)

A: No need to go there-YES, anything with pom-poms.

Q: Beaver hunting? (Conrad/Hillsville)

A: Hummm,  No comment, Conrad. But maybe you should start up a league.

Send your inquiries to: [email protected]

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