Photos by Margo Jenkins and Jesse Bassham
Thursday night at the Hessey-Turner gym, Hillsboro tipped off the girls’ and boys’ basketball game against MNPS district rival, Cane Ridge. The girls lost a heartbreaker in an intense double-overtime loss for the Lady Burros (44-42 DBL OT ) have been competing against each other for years and there are not two more competitive coaches who always have disciplined teams. The boys basketball team (13-3 / 8-0) has been a thundering herd of burros recently, winning 9 of their last 10 games.
The boys team chemistry has grown and become more intuitive over the last three and half years. They were a little cool to start, heated up a packed gym with determination by the middle of the second. Tops performers were Arnez Anderson (22 pts / 9 rbs) Cortez Howard-Graham (21 pts / 6 rbs / 2 stls), and Xavier Washington (21 pts / 9 rbs ).
Head Coach Rodney Thweatt was thrilled to have another win in the book maintaining Hillsboro’s undefeated in districts record. After their trip to to TSSAA state semi-finals last year, the Burro Heard student section has come to expect no less than another undefeated D11 showing.
When asked to assess the first half of the season, Coach Thweatt remarked, “being out for 10 days due to snow decays some of the things we have been trying to get better at, so we just have to get back to work and get in the gym and get some consistency.” He went on to state the specific areas they will be working on “The four big things we need to improve are decision making, consistency, rebounding and taking care of ball.”
The Raven’s came to play with a renewed intensity set by new head coach, Chris Hite, a former Overton graduate and most recently, an assistant coach at CPA. He was hired this summer to take over Martin Simms who was promoted to administration over the summer. While inconsistent in the first half, the Ravens made adjustments at halftime and played a cleaner, more defensive game in the second. The Ravens had solid performances from Tyshaun Poore (12 pts./ 2 blks), and Avyion McCleton (12 pts./ 4 steals).
Notables…. Hillsboro plays Overton at home Tuesday 1-30 at 6:00/7:30 The theme is Pajama night make sure to be there and be loud!.. Hillsboro plays again on Friday away at Cane Ridge 6:00/7:30…and the boys play again, at Antioch the following day at 6:00
