The 3-A State Championship Matchup

Hickory High   Home  team  Champions of the Northwestern 4A/3-A vs  Rocky Mount  Visiting team Champions of the Big East 3-A.

 Red Tornadoes finished 6th in last Regular season State Poll -Rocky Mount 2nd

Hickory Red Tornadoes 28-3 - Beat Concord In Greensboro in West Regional  81-75 ot.  Rocky Mount Gryphons 26-3- beat Triton Saturday in Fayetteville for East Regional 82-67.

This will be Hickory's third trip to State Championship game 0-2  Rocky Mount 7th 4-2

Head Coach Hickory  Shawn Johnson  8th year- Rocky Mount Mike Gainey 15 year.

Top Players:  Hickory Jordan Walls-Davis, Zack Jarrett,   Rocky Mount Terrill Hilliard, Levon Brutus

Hickory has won 11 in a Row.  Rocky Mount 18 in a row.

Hickory  has 40,010 Population.  Rocky Mount 57,477

Lenoir Rhyne University  is in Hickory.  North Carolina Wesyelan College in Rocky Mount.

Notable citizens:  Hickory  Dale Jarrett Nascar Champion and TV Nascar announcer and the father  of Red Tornadoe player Zack  Jarrett.  Rocky Mount  Buck Leonard Baseball hall Of fame.

Hickory is located in in Catawba County.  Rocky Mount in Nash-Edgecombe

Game Time 7.30pm March 10th 2012 at the Dean Smith Center on the Campus of UNC-Chapel Hill.

The 3-A final is the 4th game of the day.  Noon Southside vs Bishop McGuiness 1-A Girls

Plymouth vs Winston Salem Prep  1-A boys game at 2.30pm

Burlington Williams vs Charlotte Harding 3-A girls championship 5pm

Championship Week Begins

This morning all of the teams left still vying for the State Championship their coaches, principals and Athletic Directors meet to have news conferences with every major news outlet in North Carolina will meet in Durham  to probe and question them about there teams. Mike Gainey will be in the spot light for the Gryphons.

Tickets go on sale at 8.00am Tuesday in Coach Gainey's office. Advanced tickets are $9 and if you wait when you walk in the Dean Dome Saturday they will be 10 bucks. Just like two years ago the 3-A game is the prime time game and is scheduled to start at 7.30.pm.

The Gryphons will be the visiting team  and will wear blue.Coach Gainey wants every one wearing blue  to the game.

The Gryphon boys remain undefeated 18-0 in 2012. Saturday's lost broke a 19  game winning streak for the girls.

The boys five playoff games they have won by 17 points per game.  The closest being 14 points.  I sure would rather have had a 68-66 game along the way.

Burlington Williams in their zone defense deployed one of their taller girls on the point which caused the Lady Gryphons to shoot over a taller player on most of their outside shots. The Strategy worked.

Chant heard from Hawks crowd before the game  " We Believe"------"We are going to win".  "We believe"---"We are going to win".  Chant from Gryphons fans near the end of game.  "We Know"---"We have won".  "We Know"--- We have won".

Two locals refs that I know about called games in Fayetteville this week.  Ron Fly who now lives in Goldsboro  but formerly of Rocky Mount  was one of the refs in the girls game that followed the Gryphon boys.

  D J   Don Johnson had games in the Arena last week.  He had earned the Rocky Mount game Wednesday night but being a Graduate of Rocky Mount , his wife  Wanda a grad and all three of his sons graduated Rocky Mount, D J asked to be moved for a possible conflict of interest.  If you ever saw the Andy Griffith Show where Andy is asked to umpire a championship in which the umpire is sick and Andy fills in, and Andy calls Opie out at home where weeks later a picture taken by Helen shows Opie safe.  Don didn't want any part of the Rocky Mount game cause that a call he might make go against the Gryphons and all the Gryphon Nation be upset with him.  Conflict of interest works both ways.

I sure hope the Pep Band  goes to Chapel Hill again this year.  That really added a lot to the atmosphere for the 12,000or so that were there.

More news to pass on.   Gryphon baseball had three home games last week and lost all three.  14-1 to Rose.  3-0 to Southern Wayne and 15-1 to Riverside.  So far two runs in three games.  The Grypons are young and tender this year.

Girls softball is 0-2.  They lost to Tarboro 9-7 and to Louisburg 8-1.  They are improved this year and were playing with four or five starters still playing basketball.  They will be joining softball       
   this week.