Last week my headline indicated that the fate of the Rye High School boys’ basketball team depended on them beating Buena Vista for a second time. I was wrong.
Despite a 65-58 loss, Rye will face #3 seed Centauri (18-3) in the regional tournament.
Head Coach Lane Sherwood explained the way things transpired. “3A is confusing for sure,” Sherwood shared.
“The district tournament is really just used to determine where regionals are hosted.
So, the winners from the eight district tournaments host regionals, then after that seeds 9-32 get sent out to those eight host sites based off of seeding. Winning more games in our district tournament would’ve helped bump us up to a higher seed for sure, but since we stayed top 32 after losing the pigtail we still get a regional invite.”
Sherwood was not pleased with the results against Buena Vista.
“We waited around too long against Buena Vista and played not to lose the game rather than playing to win it.
We showed in the last three minutes that were a better team than Buena Vista.
When we set the tone, we’re tough to beat, but when we let other teams dictate the pace we seem to struggle, and that was exactly what happened in the Buena Vista game.”
Brandon Benz scored 19 points to lead the T-Bolts.
Benz also had three assists and a steal. Codah Graber scored 18 points, had eight rebounds, and a steal.
Derick Bak and Colton Pool had half a dozen rebounds each and Jay Graham had a pair of assists.
BV and Rye were tied 27-27 at the intermission but BV outscored Rye 20-5 in the third quarter. Rye returned the favor, outscoring BV 2618 in the final quarter but it wasn’t enough to overcome the third quarter deficit.
Buena Vista shot 49% from the field, while Rye shot 36%. Rye won the charity line with 77% shooting to BV’s 45%.
In the upcoming, March 3 contest, Centauri is seeded #3 in the state while Rye is seeded #30 in the 32 team field.
Game time is 5 p.m.