A strong season came to a close for East Webster boys and girls basketball this past week as they both fell victim to two of Class 2A’sbest teams in New Site.
After getting first in Class 2A, Region 2 in the regular season, the Lady Wolverines came up just short of winning it all in the district tournament with a tough loss to Calhoun City. That had the team taking on a New Site team that beat them 61-14 in the regular season all the way back before the new year.
This time around was a much different feel against the state’s top 2A squad. The Lady Wolverines were in the game trailing 22-16 at the half, but a huge third quarter by the home team allowed New Site to pull away and win it 65-44.
Turnovers were an issue for the Lady Wolverines with 31 of those turning into 37 points. New Site outscored EWHS by 30 points in that category as the Lady Wolverines were only able to connect on seven points off of 21 turnovers on defense. Whitney Winter finished her career with 13 points in the game and Shan Culpepper had 10.
In the boys game, New Site steadily built the lead and added on to it each quarter taking a 13-5 advantage after one quarter and pushing it out to a 70-43 final to end the year for the Wolverines. With starting point guard Blake Slay out with injury, head coach Jon Ginn had to turn to several youngsters to play minutes and it was tough to combat a 64% shooting night for New Site.
Chandler Hodges had 15 points to lead the way with Cade Morrow scoring 11 points in the loss.
“Our kids battled and gave everything they had. I couldn’t ask for anything more effort wise. Both our girls and boys felt like they had a chance to win,” Ginn said. “The girls were really close for a while and the boys just slipped away in the fourth quarter. As far as our kid’s willingness to invest in what we were doing, I couldn’t ask for anything more. There was alot of focus and determination in our practices, especially with our seniors.”
Now for what’s next.
Ginn returns the bulk of the girls basketball team next season with two critical offensive weapons gone in the form of Whitney Winter and Meri-Grace Gregg. That’s over 20 points per game lost, but they also bring back one of the best post tandems in the state in Shan and SHameriah Culpepper who combined for nearly 19 points and 16 rebounds a game.
Add in point guard Lauren Graves and some key role players and there’s a lot to be optimistic about next year.
“I think we can be highly successful with the girls next season. We have to find somebody that can shoot consistently for us next year and I think Lauren is going to be good for us. But we’re going to have to develop some girls that are able to at least keep defenses honest,” Ginn said. “As far as our ability to defend and get up and down the court it may actually be better next year than it was this year. We’ll have the best front court with the sisters in 2A.”
As the boys team wrapped up a 16-7 season that saw them also finish with the regular season one seed, they’re now looking to take the next step. The boys are looking for a division crown and to press forward in the 2Aplayoffs next year and they’ll have all the ingredients to do it.
Reid Gatlin was a senior this year and the team will miss his 3-point shooting as well as the leadership of post player Kaleb Parish, but everyone else will be back. It’s a well-balanced team that will be led by Hodges as the big center came into his own this season with 10.9 points and 6.2rebounds a game and he got better each year.
The team will also return players like Slay and Chrismond who averaged over eight points a game each and Hayes Fason returns after putting together a really good season off the bench. Add in Zy Ford who missed most of the season this year due to injury and there’s no reason that the Wolverines shouldn’t be one of the teams to beat in the division.
“Last summer we really missed not being able to have a real summer. Offseason, the guys that aren’t playing other sports will start in the weight room and skill development. We’ve got to have a great summer,” Ginn said. “There will be some good competition for us. The future is very bright for us over the next few years. I think we’ve got a chance to be better next year than we were this year and we’d like to stake our claim on an outright division title in the tournament.”
