The McDermitt High School boys basketball team stood at 2-18 overall and 1-4 in league play coming into last Friday’s home game against Wells. The only McDermitt win in the Eastern 1A came against Carlin on Jan. 18 at home, when they pounded the Railroaders 76-40.
On Friday, Feb. 1, Wells came to town and took down the Bulldogs 54-30.
“Against Wells we missed a lot of shots, and that kind of grinds on your psyche a little bit,” said MHS head coach Jack Smith. “We missed a lot of routine shots. If we had made those we would have been right there in a close game. Wells is physical and they out-muscled us. They look like they are the team to beat right now. It was a hard loss.”
Wells raced out to a 13-2 lead in the first quarter and never looked back. After taking a 29-12 advantage into halftime, the Leopards used a 12-4 run in the third quarter to take a 25-point lead.
Jagger Hinkey paced McDermitt with 14 points and 14 rebounds for a double-double. The junior also contributed four steals and four assists. Ben Draunidalo added nine points, seven rebounds and four steals.
Enrique Villalobos netted four points and Alex Navarro had two points.
Jackpot pulls away to
beat McDermitt
League-leading Jackpot made the trip to McDermitt on Saturday afternoon and left with a 58-31 win. However, the Jaguars had to earn the victory, needing a 23-5 spurt in the fourth quarter to secure the win.
“We probably played the best three quarters that we have all year, but we let it slip away in the fourth,” Smith said. “We took a gamble, but that is why Jackpot is undefeated. They are pretty swift. Jagger keeps us hanging around and he is the closest thing that we have to a point guard, and he should be our center. Basically, our center is playing point guard. Ben should be in the post, and he is playing the No. 2 guard position. Those guys would really be shining if we had a true point guard.”
Jackpot held a three-point lead after eight minutes of play and increased the margin to 25-15 at halftime.
Hinkey and Draunidalo paced McDermitt with 11 and nine points, respectively. Hinkey added nine rebounds and five assists and Draunidalo had seven rebounds and four steals.
Andrew Villalobos added four points and 13 rebounds and Waylon Nino had four points. Navarro added a bucket for two points.
It was also Winterfest for McDermitt last week and Andrew Villalobos was named the 2019 Winterfest king.
Hinkey is averaging 17.8 points per game with 7.7 rebounds, while Draunidalo gets 15.6 and 6.4 boards.
McDermitt traveled to Carlin on Friday and results were not available at press time.
Saturday's road game against Owyhee has been canceled and McDermitt has been awarded a forfeit victory.
The Bulldogs’ regular season finale will be held at Eureka on Friday, Feb. 15 at 5 p.m.
The Northern 1A Regional Tournament will be held Feb. 21-23 in Reno at Wooster and Hugh high schools, with the top four teams qualifying from the Eastern 1A.
“We are trying to have real enthusiastic practices right now,” Smith said. “It is tough to win on the road at all three of those places. We are going to go in and be as enthusiastic as we can and try to have as much fun as we can and see what happens.”
