With a score of 40-36, the Varsity Boys Basketball team defeated the Denton Braswell Bengals on Feb. 28, in the Area Round, at Coppell High School to move on to the Regional Quaterfinals of the playoffs.

“We tried to make sure we would be prepared for not getting caught off guard,” Head Coach Duane Gregory said. “We were ready for what plays they were running.”

Gregory said the team’s approach hasn’t changed in the transition from regular season to playoffs.Boy

“Our district is very strong,” he said. “All four playoff teams in our district have advanced to the regional quarterfinals. We feel like we’ve been playing playoff caliber teams for some time now.”

The team was tied at halftime and fell behind to start the fourth quarter.

“They shot a lot of threes,” sophomore Chendal Weaver said. “We had to adjust and begin boxing them out just like we did in practice.”

Sophomore Jared Washington said the team never lost hope.

“We thought to ourselves that that could have been our last game of the season,” he said. “And whenever you think about something like that, it just makes you go out there and play harder and make smarter decisions.”

The boys were able to mount a comeback and keep the opposition to four points in the last quarter.

“Our boys wer better on defense and rebounding,” Gregory said. “They made two shots in the quarter with no free throws. Our defense really took over and allowed us to get the win.”

The team faces the Legacy Broncos tonight in hopes of continuing their season.

“We played them twice in district,” Washington said. “Those games allowed us to know what things we need to look at in order to stop them. We need to make sure that we do the simple stuff right and think to ourselves that this is a game that we can’t take for granted.”