Mansfield Summit downs Amarillo, O.D. Wyatt falls in 2OTs at the 5A Region I tournament

After surviving a three-point barrage by Amarillo in the first quarter, the Mansfield Summit boys basketball team settled in and did what they do best.

Play defense.

Summit’s smothering man-to-man defense took its toll as the game went on allowing the Jaguars to hold off Amarillo 55-48 in the Class 5A Region I semifinals on Friday at the Yeager Coliseum.

“We’ve been doing that all year,” said Summit coach Emund Prichett, whose team lost to Amarillo the past two seasons in the same round. “Early in the year someone came to me and asked me if I thought that this was the best defensive team I’ve had and I said ‘no way’. But as the year has been going on I’m starting to believe it.

“These guys have just been resilient all year. I’m very proud of them.”

Summit (33-4), ranked No. 11 in the final Texas Association of Basketball Coaches’ Class 5A state poll, struggled early with the packed in zone defense by No. 7 Amarillo (33-5) that didn’t allow the high-low combo of David Terrell to Richard Lemboye to get rolling.

Both teams settled for three pointers early with Sandies guard Braden Hausen hitting three of Amarillo’s six three-pointers in the first period.

But Summit answered with all threes as well. Jeffery Scott had two threes for the Jaguars as neither team showed any intent on getting the ball inside.

The Sandies led 18-12 lead after one quarter with all the scoring on both sides coming on three-point baskets.

The Jaguars did a better job of breaking down the Amarillo zone in the second quarter. The Sandies went scoreless in the final 3:41 before the intermission while Summit was using a 5-0 run to pull within four, 25-21, at the half.

While Summit’s man defense was wreaking havoc on Amarillo, the Sandies threes dried up as well. After hitting six of eight threes in the first quarter, Amarillo was only two of 17 from beyond the arc the rest of the way.

Hausen, who had nine points to start the game, finished with 11.

“It was definitely kind of discouraging when they jumped out like that with the threes,” said Terrell, a University of Texas at El Paso signee, who finished with 12 points and seven assists. “But our guys helped us...our bench helped us and we kept our hopes up and finally got some stops.”

The game saw 10 lead changes and was tied nine times and went back and forth for much of the second half.

With the game tied at 43, Terrell pinned Hausen along the sideline that forced a turnover on a five-second count. Franck Emmou followed with a three pointer off an assist from Scott with 3:41 left to give the Jags a lead they would never relinquish.

Summit built the lead to seven points on baskets by Lemboye and Terrell at 50-43 with 1:58 left. It was dicey in the final three minutes as the Jags hit only three of eight free throws, but Amarillo wasn’t able to hit a field goal in the final 4:58 of the game.

Freshman Theo Brannan was stellar for the Jaguars with 10 points and a strong defensive effort. Lemboye led Summit with a game-high 15 points and pulled down five rebounds.

“Theo [Brannan] is serious and he’s only a freshman,” said Terrell. “The smallest guy on the court with the biggest heart. I love that kid.

“And Richard [Lemboye] is undersized, but he doesn’t play like that. He plays like he’s seven foot tall.”

Scott finished with nine points. Emmou had six points, but recorded eight rebounds and seven assists.

Zach Brown led the Sandies with 13 points.

El Paso Chapin survives O.D. Wyatt in 2OTs

Fort Worth O.D. Wyatt couldn’t convert a basket with time running out in the second overtime as El Paso Chapin escaped in a 69-68 thriller in the second semifinal.

No. 18 Chapin (30-6) will meet No. 11 Mansfield Summit (33-4) at noon on Saturday back at the Yeager Coliseum in a battle for a state tournament berth .

“This is just regional playoff basketball,” said Wyatt coach DeMarqus James. “Two good teams. Two teams that didn’t want to lose and it comes down to this sometimes. It just didn’t bounce our way.”

Wyatt (20-11), No. 9 in the final TABC 5A poll, trailed by 11 points, 24-13, at the 7:13 mark of the second quarter after neither team had led by more than four points until just before the end of the opening frame.

From that point the Chaparrals went on a 19-4 run over the rest of the second quarter and early into the third period.

Myles Rigsby’s dunk with 5:02 left before halftime sparked the Chaps, cutting the lead to 24-18. Rigsby had 10 points during the spree that ended with Wyatt up 32-28 with 7:35 left in the third.

It was a battle all game between guards Bryson Goldsmith of Chapin and Wyatt’s Rigsby. Goldsmith played a huge role to keep the Huskies in the game creating on offense with 17 of his team-high 26 points coming in the second half.

Rigsby was just as stellar as he poured in a game-high 28 points for Wyatt.

“The two best players and both of them tried to put their teams on their backs,” said James. “Myles made the last play and made the right play by dropping it off in there, but we just missed the layup.”

Goldsmith had a chance to win it in regulation for Chapin, but his wild, 12-foot jumper at the buzzer missed.

Things looked bleak for the Chaparrals at the end of the first overtime. Tied at 62, 7’0” center Nicholas Gunter fouled out with 0.5 left on the clock, putting Chapin’s Jayden Leverett at the foul line for two shots.

The Chaps got a reprieve when Leverett missed both.

Goldsmith sat out over two minutes of the second overtime with cramps, but fellow guard Brandon Hymes stepped up. Hymes scored the last six points of the game, all in the last 1:24, including the game winner with nine seconds left.

Wyatt had no time outs and one last shot when Rigsby dribbled up the court and cut through the lane. Rigsby passed the ball off to D’Adrian Thomas at the last second, but the shot came up a little short and rolled off the edge of the rim.

“This is the best group that I’ve had here at O.D. Wyatt and I’ve been the head coach here for nine years,” said James, who reached the regional semifinals in 2018, but lost to Amarillo. “They’re a very talented group and they’ve came to work every week from the spring all the way to now.

“They battled and had to because we played one of the toughest schedules I’ve ever scheduled. It may hit me later on, but I’m not that upset because it’s very hard to win seven games to win a state championship in Texas.

“We’ve done everything that we could to win this game and I’m happy that we put forth a one hundred percent effort.”

This story was originally published March 4, 2023 at 1:00 AM.