It’s Award Season πŸ‘ for Winter Sports and we are adding more to the list when and where its appropriate. This one is a No-Brainer !

Photos πŸ“· curtosey of Velvet Leonard

Kayla Young would be an unanimous selection for Three Rivers District JV Girls πŸ‘§ Player of the Year !

The award doesn’t exist so we will have to call it something like, OneofUs.Care Player of the Year for the Region of Southwest Virginia at the Junior Varsity Girls level.

Glad we do not have to pay by the letter.

The team finished 18-4 and captured both the regular season crown πŸ‘‘ and the tournament crown πŸ‘‘ this year. Our 8th grader was part of a team that shook of the effects of facing Pulaski County twice early on and once the team starting rolling there was no stopping them.

The District does award a Tournament Champion plaque at the JV level. If they went deeper we would have received a Coach of the Year & Player of the Year, just as we did for both Varsity teams!

Congratulations πŸ‘πŸ‘πŸ‘ one more time, to the Coach, the Team & the School 🏫 πŸ‘

Live from Richmond, curtosey of Mrs.Dalton. We will be there from beginning to end !

200 Medley is first up shortly after 9 am

We will be updating throughout the day, until our Cavaliers are finished competing .

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Ethan Edwards has completed 200 free. Waiting on results

Ethan Edwards is second alternate for finals

He’ll have to wait and see if anyone scratches.

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Medley Relay at 17th. We are first alternate. If someone scratches, they will get to swim tonight.

***** Update

Check that. We are in. There was a DQ. Going to finals!

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Bradley dropped 1.27 for a new personal best in 200 IM. Finished 19th in a crazy fast group of IM swimmers.

Waiting on 50 Free results for Wyatt

Fan clubs in the house !

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Wyatt is second alternate for 50 Free, also in a crazy fast event.

Ethan Edwards first alternative in 100 Fly. All top 16 were sub minute.

The best of the best is clearly on display today !

11am updates –

Ethan Richardson came in 23rd in 100 Free

Bradley is second alternate for 500 Free

Wyatt up in backstroke next

Then 400 Free Medley

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Wyatt was 20th in back.

400 free on deck

400 Free Relay is in the finals in 15th place!

Kids are breaking for lunch. Headed back for finals with warm-ups starting at 4 pm.

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Evening Session :

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Carroll’s seniors up in lights

First race at 5:05

Warm-ups underway

Looking dialed in !

200 Relay finishes 16th in the State!

Wyatt on backstroke, Bradley on breaststroke, Ethan E on fly, Ethan R on free.

More photos πŸ“·

6pm – Short Break during a long day.

With the start time being 9am and the end time yet to be determined the loop borders on being a 3 Day, 2 Night circuit out of necessity.

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Boys finished 14th in 400 Free Relay.

Our quartet just completed the final race of the night πŸŒ™., just shy of 12 hours after they jumped into the Pool for warm-ups.

” They held 12th for most of the race, but got passed near the end by some crazy fast anchor leg swimmers.”

Shannon Dalton has guided us through 12 hours of coverage and for that we are incredibly grateful πŸ™

Huge thanks to Ron at Omega for rushing through these awesome shirts for the guys.

Congratulations πŸ‘πŸ‘πŸ‘ to the Swimmers πŸŠβ€β™‚οΈ but just as important, let’s show appreciation for everyone that was in the building showing support for Our Cavaliers !

Godspeed on your journey back down the Highway πŸ›£πŸ™

Let’s take a look at where we are right now with our Boys πŸ‘¦ Basketball πŸ€ program, ahead of Regional tournament.

This time last season Head Coach Anthony Barnes was celebrating his first winning season and then came the instant gratification of a rare home playoff game. Elijah Cox was playing the post for Barnes and while the program was pointing up the team wasn’t burdened with high expectations.

Cox has sinced moved on to college basketball πŸ€ and Barnes rolled the balls out this fall in hopes of replacing the 6’5 Big Man. Not only did the returning players rally around their Coach and his staff, they individually overachieved , committed to each other in an unselfish manner and then something Magical happened.

It started slow but built up steam in a hurry and by the time the end of the Calender year we were no longer sneaking up on people. By the time the team captured the Championship of the Fort Chiswell tournament there was no hiding from the “noise” that comes with that level of success.

The team currently sits at 21-2 after dropping the Three Rivers District Championship game Thursday night on The Hill.

In the first game of the triple header our Junior Varsity Girls πŸ‘§ won their Championship game over Floyd County. How does the JV team finishing up 18-4 tie into this story ?

It’s a rare occasion that a team gets to walk πŸšΆβ€β™‚οΈ off the court after their final game holding their heads up, celebrating a Win. Winning 21 out of 23 doesn’t happen often and in that 23rd game the team experienced something that they hadn’t dealt with before. With 1:57 remaining in the first half, Davis Reitzel fell to the ground near mid court with a dislocated knee.

Fortunately the injury didn’t involve any long term damage (that we know of) but still the team had to try and shake off the effects of watching their teammate and friend lay helplessly on the Gymnasium floor.

Amazingly enough, Bryce Smoot and Isaiah Easter combined for 43 points, including an 8-0 run in the closing minutes to trim the deficit from 13 down to five before the game ended 79-72.

The team is ready to open their post season run πŸƒβ€β™‚οΈ Tuesday night πŸŒ™ on The Hill. Barnes and Company will host Abingdon and if they advance beyond they will get the thrill of playing at Cassell Coliseum on the campus of Virginia Tech.

Chances are the dream season will end before the team would be cutting down the nets in the Siegal Center at Virginia Commonwealth University. Wow, do I hope that this team gets the Hollywood ending (even though they don’t actually get to cut down the nets) but if they do not we should still celebrate the ride that this group of Student Athletes has taken us on.

Here’s the thoughts from Head Coach Anthony Barnes :

” So last night, what an emotional roller coaster of a night, I had actually along with Coach Redd went and watched Floyd Wednesday night vs Radford after practice to see if they were doing anything different, just like as in past years and this season they come into the game with high energy and physical play, I feel like eventually at some point we would wear them down and finish them off then Davis goes down, it was definitely a momentum swing and we go into half only down 2, we settled some on some shots too quick and other good looks and shots would not go and rattle out, the other coin they didn’t miss and made some tough contested shots. Foul trouble with Easter hurt us, we shot well from floor and decent from 3 but it was just not enough. It was a heavy weight battle, we took some shot the withstood ours and in the end they got the decision. Well coached team.Proud of my guys in Davis player of year, Bryce 1st team and Richardson second team selection. Almost perfect regular season, District Champs first time in 11 years, two 1000 point scorers , on 10 in history. So we dust ourselves off, get up and back to work. Never quitting or giving up. “

We have reached the conclusion of the first act and what a first act it was! We have a few days to let it all soak in and then we start over on act II.

Alleghany @ Spotswood Girls πŸ‘§, Cougars and Trailblazers locked πŸ”’ up in a defense battle in Penn Laird

Region play is underway across the Old Dominion and we will highlight two teams that we are very familiar with. Alleghany (17-6) made the long trek over, up and over to Spotswood (17-7). The Trailblazers are surging now at the end of the season, having just run the table in the Valley District tournament.

At the half its Spotswood 16, Alleghany 14. Second Half about to get underway !

Spotswood with a fast start in the second half, pushes their lead to 24-16 @ 4:37 (3rd)

End of the 3rd – Spotswood 36-20.

The Trailblazers are one year up on Carroll County in that this is their first season with their 4-year star, Zoli Khalil. The 6’0 Guard is now playing for a 21-4 Virginia Commonwealth University team and the current team is very, very young. Learning to play without the leadership of a next level player is a challenge and Spotswood struggled at the beginning of the season.

Possible road map to life after Alyssa Ervin next year.

Coach Dodson is about to dispatch a solid Alleghany team from the Three Rivers District, albeit the Cougars were playing a long way from 🏑 tonight. Final minute now. 42-28 your final score.

7:19 – The fighting Dodson’s live to play another day.