HICO — Midland Trail went inside, and left Pocahontas County on the outside looking in.

In a Class A Region 3, Section 1 boys semifinal Thursday night at Midland Trail High School, the host Patriots crawled out of an early hole and claimed a 62-61 victory on Joey Fox’ putback with 10.7 seconds to go. The winning goal capped a solid second-half rally that saw the Patriots constantly venture into the paint and come away with crucial points to get back into contention.

The Patriots’ Kelly Minter and Casey Deskins combined for 26 points on the night, with 16 of those occurring in the second half, as the Patriots (12-5) surged to cut the deficit to six, 48-42, with one quarter remaining, and finally took the lead 51-50 on a Minter bucket in the lane with 5:15 to go.

Pocahontas eventually went back up 59-55 when senior Jimmy Wiley converted both ends of a one-and-one, but the hosts reclaimed the lead, 60-59, on a Deskins deuce with 59.7 ticks left.

The Warriors weren’t finished, getting a difficult foul line jumper from Wiley with 32 seconds left to go ahead 61-60. Trail missed a go-ahead shot but regained possession as the ball went out-of-bounds with 15 seconds remaining, setting up Fox’ winning shot.

Fox, who didn’t start after missing practice earlier in the week, wound up leading Class A co-No. 6 Trail with 20 points, including four three-point goals. Minter scored 16 and Deskins 10.

“We’ve been preaching all week in practice that, if we had to play them, we felt we could go inside and score,” Patriot coach Greg Crist said. “We’re not real tall, but we’re big-bodied.

“We can’t win shooting threes; we took it inside nicely tonight.

He said much practice time has been spent recently teaching the players “how to post up and get spacing. You’ve got to act like you want it.”

Pocahontas coach Robert Sheets felt the Patriots got a little too aggressive in establishing their interior presence.

“They are a stronger team than we are inside,” he said. “They pounded us on the inside, and the officials let them do that and they scored.

“It came down to a pushing and shoving match.”

Sparked by 15 points each from Wiley and Jerry Simonin, the Warriors built a 34-25 halftime advantage. With the Pocahontas lead at 13-9, Simonin buried a trey from the right wing and then hit a transition deuce off a Wiley steal and assist to put the Warriors up 18-9.

Wiley’s double-clutch in the lane ended the first period at 20-12, then he nailed a fadeaway jumper from the left baseline as the second-quarter buzzer went off to hand his team a nine-point intermission lead. The Warriors twice led by 11 during the second frame.

Wiley produced a 30-point night to pace the Warriors, while Simonin added 18.

“I’m real proud of Jimmy,” Sheets said. “He really (came through) tonight.”

“They shot the lights out,” Crist added. “Wiley is a real nice player; he can score inside and outside. He’s so hard to guard.”

For Pocahontas, Jed Sheets contributed nine points and assisted on two late goals —  one by Wiley and the other by Tanner Graham, the latter giving the Warriors a 57-53 margin at the 3:07 mark.

The Warriors closed their campaign with a 10-7 record.

“It’s devastating for the kids who worked so hard and played well enough to win,” Sheets said. “I told (the players) I was extremely proud of them and they played and represented the high school extremely well.”

— E-mail: skeenan@

register-herald.com



Midland Trail 62, Pocahontas County 61

Pocahontas County (10-7)

Jimmy Wiley 10 8-8 30, Jed Sheets 4 0-0 9, Jerry Simonin 7 1-1 18, Lakota Jonese 1 0-0 2, Dillon Kelley 0 0-0 0, Seth Doss 0 0-0 0, Tanner Graham 1 0-0 2. Totals: 23 9-9 61.

Midland Trail (12-5)

Caleb Carte 2 1-2 5, Joey Fox 8 0-0 20, Casey Deskins 5 0-3 10, Kelly Minter 7 2-2 16, Noah Sparks 2 0-0 4, Jordan Burdette 3 1-2 7, Mark Nickell 0 0-0 0, Casey Kessler 0 0-0 0, Sidney Crist 0 0-0 0. Totals: 27 4-9 62.

PC    20    14    14    13    —    61

MT    12    13    17    20    —    62

Three-point goals: PC: 6 (Wiley 2, Sheets, Simonin 3); MT: 4 (Fox 4); Fouled out: none.