BASKETBALL

Cavemen discuss road to district title

Matt Hollinshead
Carlsbad Current-Argus

CARLSBAD – The Carlsbad boys basketball team’s path to this year’s District 4-6A regular season title is going to make for one heck of a story one day.

For the Cavemen, the 2015-2016 season has included a long road trip to Palm Springs, Calif., just eight home games, losing one of their top players for an extended period and, according to coach Jamal Brown, the first district title in 44 years.

“That road journey alone that we’ve had this year has been a monumental task to ask any kid to miss that much school, to miss that much family time. But they love it, and they’d do it again without question,” Brown said. “I’d hate to rack up the mileage total on the bus.”

Carlsbad’s in-state road trips included Gadsden, Deming and Las Cruces. Carlsbad also went to the Albuquerque Academy tournament for three nights.

The Cavemen (20-7) then participated in the MaxPreps Holiday Classic tournament on Dec. 28-30, which Brown, a Ventura, Calif., native, previously said would help his team make a deeper playoff run because of the experience facing beefed up competition.

Carlsbad lost to California’s Rancho Mirage (74-39) and Capistrano Valley (67-42) during the first two days of the tournament, but responded the third night with a 65-41 win over California’s Cabrillo High.

All three of those California schools currently have a combined record of 75-14 this season.

Brown said all that time playing on the road made Carlsbad “seasoned and hardened,” confident they could win games at any gym they step foot into.

Since that west coast trip, Carlsbad’s won 11 of its past 15 games. Some of Carlsbad’s key victories include road wins at Volcano Vista and at Eldorado, a buzzer-beater against Roswell, as well as back-to-back 17-point wins against Hobbs.

"We had a lot of ups and downs. Everyone stepped up, brought their A-game and got the job done," senior point guard Ralph Cueto said.

It hasn't been the smoothest season, however.

Junior center Brenden Boatwright missed eight games with a sprained left ankle. Carlsbad struggled to make shots sometimes, including during its home game against Hobbs. Yet, Carlsbad won seven of its eight games without Boatwright.

“You can’t put it into words. These kids worked so hard. This community needs to know how special this team is,” Brown said.

Hobbs wrestled the district title away from Carlsbad the previous two years in a tiebreaker games. In the first tiebreaker game, Brown said Hobbs won on a banked 3-point shot in overtime.

“That was gut-wrenching to not only lose, but just to see the look of the aspiration on those kids’ faces to be that close,” Brown said.

In the second tiebreaker game last year, Hobbs won again and went on to win the 6A state title.

“What we’re asking these kids to do is beat a state champion. This year’s team learned from these two [tiebreaker games] and remembered their brothers from the past. They didn’t want that feeling anymore,” Brown said.

Carlsbad managed to re-write history this year, beating Hobbs on Monday.

Cueto said "it made everything special" for the team, Brown and the community.

With that goal checked off the list, Carlsbad is now turning its attention to winning the district tournament championship game, which starts at 7 p.m. Saturday at the CHS Gymnasium, and going deeper in the state tournament.

Carlsbad’s state tournament appearance last year was short-lived, losing a 51-50 heartbreaker to Albuquerque High in the quarterfinals.

“There’s nothing that we can’t do when we work together,” Boatwright said.

Current-Argus Sports Editor Matt Hollinshead may be reached at 575-628-5518.