Southlake Carroll vs. Justin Northwest, 8 p.m. Jan. 31
Where: Southlake CarrollRecords: Southlake Carroll 13-13 (3-4 in district); Justin Northwest 19-6 (5-2 in district) (before Tuesday)Analysis: The Dragons will take on the Texans next Tuesday in a matchup that could be pivotal in Carroll's bid to make the playoffs. They find themselves one game behind Keller and Fossil Ridge, who sit at 4-3 in the district and tied for fourth. They are two games behind Northwest and Coppell, who are tied for second. If the Dragons are going to finish in the top four in District 7-5A, they're going to need to make their own luck against the teams ahead of them.This begins on Tuesday against the Texans. They are coming off a big win against Fossil Ridge in which they needed overtime to take a seven-point win. They will have to contend with Todd Christensen on the interior, as he is averaging 9.7 rebounds per game and coming off a 15-point game against Fossil Ridge.The Dragons have struggled of late to get any offense going - excluding Max Berman, Carroll is averaging 33.4 points per game. In just two of the previous nine games have the Dragons topped the 50-point plateau, which puts an inordinate amount of pressure on the defense to hold the other teams' point totals down.Grapevine vs. Haltom, 8 p.m. FridayWhere: GrapevineRecords: Grapevine 16-12 (5-5 in district); Haltom 6-13 (3-6 in district)Analysis: Grapevine has reached what is arguably their most important stretch of games this season, as they will play Haltom, followed by Irving Nimitz, Euless Trinity and Irving MacArthur - all teams that are in the hunt for postseason bids."I think that as the pressure continues to increase, I have seen these athletes step up in different ways that maybe I wasn't expecting," Grapevine head coach Kevin Starnes said. "They're coming together as a team better than we have all year, and that as a coach is very rewarding to me, because I want them to become like a family."While the Mustangs do face almost all of their direct competition in the remaining six games of the season, they are now done with Colleyville Heritage, and they play one game against Richland. Those two teams represent the class of the district. It is believed that the Mustangs need to win at least four of their last six games to give themselves a good shot at the state tournament.The Mustangs lost 59-46 against the Panthers from Heritage in their game on Friday, but Starnes thought there were positives to take from that game."They exposed flaws in our team," Starnes said. "When those types of games happen, we've got to assess and see certain things. If we can do that, we can build off of that loss. We need to figure out what's wrong, and I think Friday helped us to figure some things out."One person who turned heads was Marcus Dempsey, who reached another career high by going 6-for-8 from three point land on the way to 23 points to lead the Mustangs.Have more to add? News tip? Tell us
