Prep Basketball Report

ROGERS HERITAGE

War Eagles off to great start

Rogers Heritage is off to its best start in school history.

The War Eagles (11-2) have won a school-record 10 in a row and recently claimed the Enid (Okla.) Holiday Classic title over the Christmas break. They also won the Arvest Hoopfest championship.

Senior Seth Stanley earned tournament Most Valuable Player honors in Enid. But he's been great all season, averaging a team-high 21.3 points and 6.4 rebounds per game. The 6-foot-5 swingman is also averaging 58 percent from the floor and 42 percent from beyond the 3-point arc to go with 2.7 assists per game.

But Heritage coach Tom Olsen the War Eagles' outstanding team chemistry has been a key to their success.

"They are sharing the ball and seeing the benefits from it," Olsen said. "They had 18 assists on 21 field goals in the championship game in Enid. You want to know why we've won 10 in a row, we've been efficient offensively and that stats prove that. We play unselfishly and get the ball to the right people."

"We've averaged 11 turnovers in 57 possessions and that's faster than we've ever played with fewer turnovers. We're a negative two in rebounding, but positive two in turnovers. We've also made 198 free throws as a team, while our opponents have only shot 188. The icing on the cake is we're shooting 41 percent from behind the arc as a team and our opponents are only shooting 27 percent."

-- Paul Boyd @NWAPaulB

ROGERS HIGH

Lady Mounties making progress

Rogers High girls basketball coach Preston Early has seen his relatively inexperienced team take steps forward in albeit an inconsistent pre-conference schedule.

The Lady Mounties (7-6) performed well lately, finishing second in the Siloam Springs Invitational Tournament over the holidays. Rogers lost to Springdale High in the finals in a pre-7A-West conference matchup.

"We had some good moments all three days," Early said. "I was really proud of our toughness level. We're still doing things that put us in a bind. Our turnover.....//s are too high. We want to try to not beat ourselves. We really are a work in progress and a big factor for us is learning to do things well on a daily basis."

Senior Madison Loyd is Rogers' lone player in double figures, averaging 16.2 points per game. She and junior Courtney Storey have shown great leadership on and off the court, Early said.

-- Paul Boyd @NWAPaulB

SPRINGDALE HAR-BER

Streaking Wildcats starting to gel

The Springdale Har-Ber boys stumbled a little out of the gate with some injuries early in the season. The Wildcats (11-3) lost a pair of games in the BearKat Classic to open the season, then they were blasted in the Barry Pruitt Classic by North Little Rock 76-53.

Since then, the Wildcats have been on a tear, winning seven straight games including the championship of the Ronnie Brogdon Christmas Classic last weekend at Highland. Twice in the three games, the Wildcats put up 31 points in a quarter, something coach Scott Bowlin said he's never had to happen before.

"We have areas we still need to improve on," said Bowlin. "We had big leads and we sort of coasted and that's not something we can afford to do. We're going to have to play a lot more consistent. And that's hard to do. You've got to have your leadership taking control. As a coach, we can tell them and tell them, but at the end of the day, they are the guys out there that are leading that team."

Har-Ber guard Tyler Garrett, Tylor Perry and Nick Buchanan have played solid during the seven-game run, but Bowlin said the Wildcats have also gotten big contributions from other players like 6-9 senior Josh Ezell, 6-5 senior Zach Peck and guard Jack Ragsdale.

Har-Ber opens 7A-West action at home today against Rogers High in Wildcat Arena.

-- Chip Souza • @NWAChip

SPRINGDALE HIGH

Lady Bulldogs get over the hump

The third time was the charm for Springdale High's girls as the Lady Bulldogs won the Siloam Springs Holiday Classic last Saturday. Springdale had played in the finals the two previous years and fell to Holland Hall twice before knocking off Rogers High this time.

"That meant a lot to our seniors, and it meant a lot to our team to get some hardware," Springdale coach Heather Hunsucker said.

The Lady Bulldogs (9-4) open 7A-West play at Rogers Heritage today. Hunsucker said a tough nonconference schedule has prepared her team for the grind of conference play.

"We've played some really good teams, played some defending state champions," she said. "Carl Junction is ranked fifth in the state of Missouri and we're the only team that has beaten them. That win gave us some great confidence, but I just think that our schedule was built so that our team would see good teams early. We feel like we've been through the fire."

Hunsucker said she feels much more confident in her team heading into league play this season than she was a year ago.

Junior Marquesha Davis, who is drawing a lot of Division I interest, scored 27 points in the championship game at Siloam Springs, but Hunsucker said a number of players have played well and embraced their roles to help the team get off to a great start.

The return of Olivia James has been a significant boost after James missed all of last season with an ACL injury.

"For us, she's our glue player," Hunsucker said. "She is a leader for us. She's the boxer-outer, the rebounder, the screener, the smart player on defense, the hustler. Her being back has been a huge benefit for this team."

-- Chip Souza • @NWAChip

PRAIRIE GROVE

Pearson, Pittman lead Prairie Grove

Prairie Grove's chance of winning at Shiloh Christian Tuesday appeared to diminish when leading scorer Will Pridmore fouled out late in the game.

But the Tigers prevailed, mostly behind the play of senior guard D.J. Pearson.

Pearson made two free throws with 11.2 seconds remaining and finished with 22 points to lead the Tigers to a 64-61 victory over the Saints. Pridmore scored 21 points before he was called for his fifth foul with 1 minute, 57 seconds left in the game.

Prairie Grove rallied to win the game after trailing 48-43 to begin the fourth quarter. Pridmore and Pearson led the comeback by taking turns with aggressive moves to the basket. Pearson then gave Prairie Grove a 64-61 lead with his clutch free throws after he missed two attempts from the line seconds earlier.

"When it really counted, D.J. stepped up and made some big ones," Prairie Grove coach Steve Edmiston said. "D.J. was great for us in the fourth quarter. We wanted to attack the basket and that's what he did."

Like many small schools, Prairie Grove relies on football players to contribute in basketball and the Tigers (6-9, 4-3) started slowly without them. But Prairie Grove has won three of its last four while players like Anthony Johnson, Demarkus Cooper, and John David Elder round into basketball shape. All three contributed in the win at Shiloh Christian (7-5, 5-2) and the Tigers hope to continue their turnaround Friday at Lincoln.

Consecutive road wins would set up nicely for Prairie Grove, which will host Pea Ridge and Elkins at home next week.

"We had a big swing of games and didn't get in a lot of practice times when the football player first came over," Edmiston said. "We're working out the kinks and we still have a long way to go. But I think we've got enough parts and pieces where we can give people a lot of trouble."

-- Rick Fires @NWARick

BENTONVILLE WEST

Wolverines, Pointers set for rematch

Just seven days after meeting each other in the Neosho (Mo.) Holiday Classic, Van Buren and Bentonville West will square off again in the 7A-West Conference opener for both teams tonight in Van Buren.

Van Buren (9-4) won last week's meeting 53-51 on Mehki Burnett's bucket off an inbound pass with 1.6 seconds left and went on to win three out of four games, while West (10-3) finished the tournament with a 2-2 mark. Presley Kindrix had 16 points and Burnett 16 for the Pointers in that game, while West was led by Collier Blackburn with 14 points and Gabe Hornsby with 13.

While the outcome could be a similar one tonight, both teams are expected to show some new wrinkles their respective coaches saved for this game.

"The big thing about last week's game is that we stayed pretty vanilla," West coach Greg White said. "We didn't want to totally tip our hat about everything we did, but we wanted to get a good look at them, especially with the new kid, and see what they could do.

"Van Buren is a tough place to play. We just have to come up with a better plan than we did last week and hope we execute."

Van Buren coach Austin Trembley said his team was still in a growing process during the Neosho tournament and took some steps in the right direction. It also let him see that his expectations of West were almost everything he expected out of the Wolverines.

"They are physical," Trembley said. "They play tough and they are hard to score on. Greg threw a couple of different defenses that I didn't expect, and I asked him later on if he was trying to make my preparation for this game even harder. He's good at it, and I'm expecting another tough, hard-fought game this time."

-- Henry Apple • @NWAHenry

Sports on 01/05/2018