Gryphons Play in Crown Arena

My blog earlier Monday I had asked the question about whether if Rocky Mount and Northern Nash girls made it to the championship games whether you would have to pay if you left one building and went to another.

I have failed to look at the bracket locations. Tuesday is the first day and the 3-A boys begin play in the Crown Arena while the 4-A girls will play in the big Coliseum. If you are planning to attend Tuesday night make sure you are in the right building.

Friday night when the 3-A girls play they will also be in the Arena so come 4.00pm Saturday should both Rocky Mount and Northern win their semi final games they would play back to back in the Arena Saturday afternoon so one ticket you could see both.

I don't think it will make much difference Tuesday whether Rocky Mount plays in the small building or larger one I doubt there will be that many making the trip on a Tuesday all the way to Fayetteville. Now Saturday is a different matter should the Gryphons win Tuesday night.

Rocky Mount plays South Central of Winterville in the 7.00pm game in the Crown Arena. Both schools will have a near two hour drive so their is no home team in this one so the crowd will not over flow the Arena. The second game Tuesday night in the Arena is Chapel Hill High going up against Southern Lee so Southern Lee is the closes team to Fayetteville and should have a nice crowd. I would say Southern Lee has a bout the same trip we had when we went to Greenville last year.

Remember Gryphons Play in the Arena. 7.00pm

New site For East Regional

I think you will find that if you do travel this week to the East Basketball Regional that the Crown Coliseum and Arena are better equipped to handle the Regional over Greenville. Once you drive and park both the boys and girls will play without having to move to another location to see them play. The boys will play in the 10,000 seat Coliseum more than what Williams Arena at ECU has. The girls will play in the 6,000 seat Crown Arena which triples what Rose High School had. All you have to do is walk over to another building. I have no idea whether one ticket can get you in either place. I suspect your ticket is only good for the building that you are in.

I remember the year Tarboro girls played in the regional the same year Rocky Mount boys did. As soon as Rocky Mount game was over we drove to Rose where Tarboro had started just as Rocky Mount finished. By the time we found a place to park the girls were already in third quarter.

Yes, there is a major distance problem getting to Fayetteville over driving to ECU. Overall the Crown complex is better suited for the Regional. Since this is the first time hosting and Rocky Mount plays the very first game of the Regional I am sure problems will exist this year that will not next year. I suspect unless a major sponsor jumps up and ask it to be moved Fayetteville will get the Regional for a while now.

Tried to catch up on all our college baseball players over the weekend, here ‘s what I found.

ECU: Tyler Joyner (Northern Nash) Sitting out this year.

Wake Tech: Three players from area playing. Gabe Brown(Rocky Mount), Cameron Ramsey(Rocky Mount) and T J Taylor Nash Central

Pitt CC: Jim Leggett (Rocky Mount) and Mike Williams (Northern Nash)

Miami Dade College: Brian Goodwin (Rocky Mount)

North Carolina Wesleyan: Tyler Clark (Northern Nash) ,Daniel Moore( Northern Nash), Brian Allen (Southern Nash), Brett Allen (Southern Nash), Eric Mull (Faith Christian), Andrew Webb(Northern Nash) and Chad Womble (Rocky Mount).

North Carolina A&T: Xavier Macklin (Nash Central) Batting 389 7-18 3 homers and seven rbi

Campbell: Ben Fish( Rocky Mount) Batting 384. Started five of seven games.

UNC-Pembroke: Alex Pearce (Nash Central) started six games for the Braves.

Barton: Collins Cuthrell. Started every game this season hitting 222

If there are more send me a message. In some cases I haven’t seen a roster for a school so I can’t tell who we might have on their team.

Will not blog Tuesday until after the basketball game. Go Gryphons!

NCAA Bound NCW Fighting Bishops

Last year John Thompson Bishops won the regular season but found themselves playing for the right to go to NCAA Div. III playoffs but in order to do so they had to beat Christopher Newport a lower seed at Newport News. The Bishops lost and with it the basketball season.

Regardless of the reason the USA South Conference has changed their conference rule that the tournament championship game would be played at the home of the highest seed. The Battling Bishops won the regular season again this year and won Friday night in the semi finals to earned the right to host Ferrum this afternoon in Everette Gym.

The Battling Bishops lead throughout the game only to see Ferrum tie the game at 65 after NCW failed to seal the deal at the free throw line. Ric Yarbrough the Bishops big man fouled out at the end of regulation so the Bishops were faced with playing a man short plus nerves as overtime commenced.

In overtime The Battling Bishops of North Carolina Wesleyan win 74-70 which was sealed by Matt Dougherty steal with twenty seconds to go in overtime after Domaris Thomas had two free throws to get a 72-70 lead. Josh Morris added one of two free throws and Dougherty one in getting the victory for the Bishops. Those four free throws allowed NCW to make over half their free shots on the game 22-39. Ferrum misery is they missed their last 19 three point tries.

Domaris Thomas was named MVP of the tournament and for the first time since 2002 North Carolina Wesleyan is NCAA Bound and will a wait the seedings. The Bishops head into the NCAA Tournament 22-6.

I have never been to a major wrestling tournament so I can't imagine how it is watching a tournament. Just trying to figure out how each person did in their weight class is hard enough. Wrestling has 14 weight classes and 16 wrestlers from four regions converged on Greensboro Thursday night to determine a state champion in each weight class and all four divisions of North Carolina. If my figuring is right they were nearly 1,800 matches before the State Champions were declared.

Nash County sent 10 wrestlers with Northern having six including an undefeated wrestler in T J Marshall. Nash Central and Rocky Mount each had two wrestlers that qualified. Regardless of the outcome over the weekend the worse any one wrestler could do is lose two matches and finish tied for 13th.

No one from Nash County came home a State champion but Tarmaris Lane of Nash Central finished the highest finishing third in the 285 division. Northern Nash's Tavis Richardson in the 140 pound class finished 6th while Rocky Mount's Janicento Williamson finished 6th at 171.

T J Marshall won his first match but was beaten in his second match to lose for the first time this year. He would win another match before losing again. Rocky Mount's Mason Holt lost his first match at 103 but won once in his second. Likewise Northern's Keith Battle lost his first match at 119 and won his second along with Demetrice Taylor of Nash Central at 130 pound lost his first match and won his second.

Nash Central scored 20 points in the team race which was well back of the 90 that it took to win. Northern scored 14.5 and Rocky Mount ten. We will try to get Tarmaris Lane, Janicento Williamson and Tavis Richardson on live next Sunday night on the Stretchlon Sports Show along with their coaches.

East Regional Is Tuesday For Gryphons

The Rocky Mount Gryphons have drawn a team that they have played twice during the regular season and won both games. South Central of the Coastal will bring a 24-5 record and two of those losses were pinned on the Falcons by Rocky Mount.

The Gryphons won 82-69 in Rocky Mount but had to make a shot at the buzzer to win in Winterville. The last game was the first week of December so it is like these two teams played last year so much has happened since then.

The winner of that game will take on the winner of Chapel Hill 21-4 and Southern Lee 23-4 game which will follow the RM-SC game which will start at 7.00pm at the Crown Coliseum. South Central makes it to the Regional after having beaten Hunt Friday night by five at Hunt.

The Lady Knights of Northern Nash have got all week to get ready as they will not hit the floor of the Crown Arena until Friday night at 7.00pm. They will be taking on Cameron Union Pines who will start the regional 24-3 while the Knights are 22-3. The winner will face the winner of South Central- Burlington Williams.

The winner of the boys game Tuesday will play the Eastern final at 4.00pm Saturday in the Crown Coliseum while over in the next building the winner of the girls Friday semi finals will play at 6.00pm Saturday in Crown Arena.

Wouldn't it be nice to watch Nash County teams in a double header.

Thanksgiving Friday Basketball

You have seen me say this many times during football season. There is nothing like playing a high school playoff game on Thanksgiving Friday night. Basketball equivalent is the Regional. If you make to to the Friday after Thanksgiving you have had a wonderful season regardless of the outcome from there. Which ever way the ball bounces next week Both Northern Nash Girls and Rocky Mount boys can say I am proud of what we did.

Grover Battle has said all along next year was Northern's time so this team is ahead of schedule. The Lady Knights have not been to the regional since 1999 where they lost in overtime. The year before that they won it all in 1998.

This year's Lady Knights have improved greatly since the thrashing they took from Rocky Mount during the Christmas Tournament. They lack speed but make that up in basketball savvy. The football teams success playing up to Thanksgiving hurt the basketball season start for Northern as they had several games altered because of football. That hurt the Lady Knights early in the season.

Their record may not be as pretty as last year but Mike Gainey will carry the Gryphons back to the Regional for the second year in a row and fourth time in eight years. If the Gryphons only had five uniforms and every time a new player came in the game they had to switch uniforms it wouldn't matter much as 14 of the 15 Rocky Mount players fit a mold. About six feet three, long arms and can run like the wind.

Those long arms are getting in the way of other teams passes and shots and just because this team is not as tall as last year doesn't mean they are not as big. Like last year the guard play has improved as the season has unfolded and this team has more fun with each other than last year.

A major factor in Rocky Mount's rise over the last month has been the play of Terrell Hilliard. Hurt all year Hilliard has finally gotten healthy from an injury in the State Championship game last year. Six feet six or so Terrell has arms longer than his legs and with his offensive ability he helps take the double teams of Exzavier Cooper.

Grover and Mike both can smile with a deep satisfaction regardless of what happens next week in Cumberland County. Both have won a State Title before and they both know what it takes to get another.

Those who will be going to Fayetteville it is as easy as pie to get to. Take exit 46 off I-95 and go right on Highway 87. That is a four lane road heading toward Fayetteville. Off that take exit 100 which is Mountain Road and go left. This is about 2 miles or so to the Coliseum. You actually never have to drive into Fayetteville. The trip is right at 100 miles and is four lane all the way.

If either or both win two games next week the 3-A finals are in Reynolds Coliseum in Raleigh in two weeks.