Here are some fun thoughts about the Thursday night victory over to Western Carolina University Catamounts…

Yes, Miss Ervin led the way in scoring as she once again reached the land of Crooked Numbers with 20 points! It’s the fifth time this season that our Sophomore has reached that platue in Purple.

The surprising loss for East Tennessee State University gave the Buccaneers a fourth league loss and creates some space as the Paladins look to head to Ashville for the SoCon tournament here in a few weeks. Both Mercer and ETSU sit at 5-4 now.

It was great to see Miss Kyraha Parnell back on the floor last night ! It was only five quiet minutes but its been a while since the injury and having her back can prove to be HUGE.

One of the most exciting things about keeping up with Alyssa through the efforts of ESPN+ is listening to the rotation of announcers as they describe the play of our All-Time scoring leader.

Last night was a new one as the term scrappy was used and that one made me smile. Kiddo certainly plays with an edge and I agree that it has a carryover effect on the team ! Emotion is certainly a part of the player from The Hill.

The team will have today as a practice day and then continue their tour of North Carolina on Saturday with a stop ✋ at the University of North Carolina – Greensboro.

Final reason for smiling took place at the start of the third quarter. Scrappy outscored the Catamounts 9-2 in the opening minutes of the second half to turn a 30-19 lead into 39-21.

Victory #15 guarantees the team will finish up with a minimum of a .500 season but Pierre Curtis and his group of overactivers have lofty goals for the next three weeks !

JV Boys 👦 off to a red hot start, leading the Cougars. 13-5!

More to follow !

Why do we care about this game ? Ryan Phillips is an up and coming young Coach and belongs to a fine family 👪 Tree 🌳 of Paul Nester. This is the first time that Ryan Phillips has held the position of Head Coach at the High School level.

  Win or Lose, we are Big Fans of EVERY Coach at the Middle School and High School level.

Halftime score at 3:56 MT time is Patrick County 36, Carroll County 29.

End of 3rd, Cougars 52-44 as the 3rd was a story of two runs 🏃‍♂️. Cavaliers start with 12-2 as Sam made his third and fourth 3-pointers but then the Cougars closed with a 14 – 3 run of its own.

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Game #2 of 7 – Alyssa Ervin and the Furman University Paladins! ESPN +.

Why do we care about this game ? Miss Ervin will always be part of our story and seeing her having fun on the Basketball court again is a blast !

1st Media TO – Furman 7, WCU 3 (4:50)

End of 1st – WCU 10-9

The announcer just called Christy’s Girl 👧 ” Scrappy “

Scrappy has 7 points as we near the half. Halftime score is Paladins 30, Catamounts 19.

Scrappy had her own highlight reel in the 3rd quarter. Moved her point total from 7 to 20 !!! ‘ Dins lead 52-33!!

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Game 3 of 7 that we care about is being played in a Gymnasium where cell phones 📵 go to die. Hailey Cushman and her Cavaliers are 9 – 5 on the season. Tonight they played at Patrick County High School in Stuart. The Cougar Den has minimal to no cellphone coverage so I will be dependent upon hearing from someone later.

Cushman is in year 2 of working with Howard Mayo and Coach does a tremendous job with her troops. This is important because if the Lady Cavaliers are going to regain some of their past glory all roads run through Cushman.

Our Athletic Director, Kevin DeHaven informed us that the Lady Cavaliers won a thrilling 39-35 contest in OT !!!

Head Coach Anthony Barnes and his Cavaliers are hosting Patrick County tonight. The Cavaliers are in the middle of five games in six days…

Patrick County opened with a 10-0 run 🏃‍♂️ so the Cavs have some ground to make up.

My, oh, My ! Down 10-0, the Cavaliers lead 21 -16 after the opening 8:00 !!!

End of 3rd, Cavs lead 53 -45…

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Game #5 of 7 that we care ❤ about is

Our tag line is Everything Duke, UVA and wherever we stay. This explains why we have the level of devotion to ALL Things Carroll County, because for six years now it where we call home.

For the past 3 months, for Medical 🚑 reasons, we have called Southern Utah home. So naturally we support the efforts of both Utah Tech ( St George ) and SUU. Normally we would be watching this one in person but tonight its about a match up here in STG ! #GoT-Birds…Tip was 6:30 Mountain ⛰ Time.

Down 59 – 49 with 11:00 to play ▶️

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Game #6 of 7 tipped at 9pm / 7pm here in St George.

Slight underdogs, the Trailblazers are leading 13 – 5 with 14 minutes to play in the opening half !

Up 17 – 9 at the under 12:00 Media TO!

Under 4:00 – Trailblazers leading the Wolverines, 35 – 21!

Headed to the break, leading 42 – 25!!

Under 16:00 – Trailblazers lead 52-36

The Ladies of these two schools just finished a close one up at UVU. Wolverines win that one with a fourth quarter rally.

Under 12:00 comes at 10:32, 60 – 51 for UT as the Wolverines are showing their claws.

TO – 8:18, UT leads  65-57 but as Lin just noted, they are having to work pretty hard for every basket 🧺 as of late.

Under 4:00 doesn’t take pace until 1:53 remains, the lead is 79 – 70. UVU had cut ✂️ it to six before UT drilled a much needed 3-pointer!

TO at 1:09 – Blazers leading 79 – 73 in a highly entertaining game.

0:34.1 – 79/75 after UT missed the front end twice in a row. Steal and basket 🧺 makes it 79-77.

We missed the front end for a third time but grabbed the board.

0:07.4 – 10th foul committed and FT made !!!!!!!

💅bighter

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Game 7 of 7 involves Howard Mayo and his Varsity Lady 👩 Cavalier team

Big fans of the Legendary Coach and appreciate 🙏 every thing he is trying hard to accomplish with our flagship program.

  I will be at the mercy of whoever wants to help create a story here as the team plays at Patrick County on Senior Night.

Text Message from Mr DeHaven :

Varsity girls up 26-19 with 5:53 left in third quarter.!!!!!

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What happens next ? Anthony Barnes will send me his thoughts about his team and the effort that he received.

I will then write ✍ him a game story because he believes his players work hard and their efforts for him belong in a story. Hence, the reason why we care ❤ about Anthony Barnes….

This is year six for us in Laurel Fork and what we do should not be a surprise to anyone out there. We believe that everyone is equal and we challenge ourselves to uphold that thought process each and every day.

The second story that will get written by me will be about Scrappy ! Why, because it is fun and doesn’t require any thoughts from Coach Pierre Curtis. Side note 📝, I would love to here his thoughts one day.

The Boys Junior Varsity game was much closer than the final score reflected. Keep our Boys heading in the right direction, Mr Phillips !

Time to create a game story for Anthony Barnes !

Carroll County 74, Patrick County 61

Cougars –  16 12 17 16 –  61

Cavaliers – 21 16 16 21 – 74

Carroll County ( 74) – Easter 38, Gravley 16, Reed 12, Reavis 4, Motley 3 Bunn 1.

The Hill – Carroll County spotted visiting 10 points in the first two minutes and 25 seconds, leading Head Coach Anthony Barnes to call an early timeout. Not sure exactly what Barnes suggested to his players but Isaiah Easter and friends caught the Cougars by 16 on the way to a much needed 74-61 Three Rivers District on Thursday night.

Saddled with playing five games in six days as each team is racing against the clock ⏰ to get the regular season completed, the team played without sixth man, Hayden Jackson. Jackson suffered a concussion during the contest on Tuesday versus Radford High.

Colton Gravley and Blake Reed had their former Junior Varsity teammates back as the duo teamed up to score 28 points. Gravley dropped 16 points while playing with the energy of the Tasmanian Devil from start to finish !

Reed ( 12 points ) matched his offensive effort while collecting Blocked 🚫 Shots like gathering Candy on Halloween 🎃.

To say that Isaiah Easter has enjoyed a storybook Senior year would be an understatement. But against the Cougars he showed us he is capable of being a Basketball Star 🌟. Easter scored in double digits in the first and final quarters on his way to a career high 38 points.

In football, its the quarterback to lead the 10 teammates on both sides of the ball to a common goal. His efforts this season at Quarterback led the gridiron 🏈 Cavaliers to a season for the ages. But in basketball, sometimes you have to just tell yourself, ” I’ve Got This ” and if a leader can do this then others will follow.

12 points in the first quarter in the sparked a 21 – 6 run to erase the early deficit. Easter took a pass from Eli Lark after the Junior stole it, scoring just before the buzzer. For good measure, Easter quickly turned around, stole the inbounds pass and scored again.

Lark, along with Landon Kinder and Landon Phillips each played key 🔑 minutes off the bench to fill the void left by the loss of Jackson. Bullpen by committing would be a solid comparison for the gritty effort !

Trace Reavis added four points before fouling out and Will Motley added three points during the fourth quarter push that allowed the Cavaliers to secure its eighth victory of the season.

Kyle Bunn rounded out the scoring column with one point and a multitude of solid defensive minutes.

There will be a small window for the Cavaliers to celebrate as they still have two more games this week and they are against the only two teams that truly bettered them the first time around. Martinsville on Friday night and Floyd County High on Saturday afternoon.

Barnes took the time to share his thoughts on the victory :

” Man slow start against a hard playing Patrick Co ,making no excuses (every team in same boat )but this is tough on the guys this week,even practiced a little harder than usual yesterday before a game because of the only practice this week and the guys responded and needed this win. Totally different team without our 6th Man in Hayden Jackson not giving the boost off the bench due to concussion suffered in a very  physical Radford game, Hayden is tough and hopefully gets better to join us soon.  Again another very physical game that was tightened up and we didn’t help it with our hands on them and contact we were playing with. Finally got things going in transition.  

   Kudos to bench guys in Bunn,Lark ,Phillips and Kinder,  guys stepped up came in done their roll and helped secure at times a  crazy ,wild physical game. Sometimes it’s not pretty, but you  survive and get it done,   but  we will take a W in this tough District anytime.  No rest for us or Coaches,  one of the best 2A schools in state in Martinsville comes too us tomorrow.  On too the next one, Go Cavs !”