Month: January 2018

With 12 seniors competing regularly, there’s a sense of finality to Orange Wrestling this season.

There’s also a sense of unfinished business.

After falling one takedown short of winning its sixth state championship last season in a two-point loss to Piedmont, Orange is now 20-0 this season. For most teams, advancing to the state quarterfinals is uncharted waters. For Orange, it’s just another step to the ultimate goal.

On Tuesday night, the Panthers defeated Morehead 53-20 to wrap up its second consecutive trip to the state quarterfinals. Morehead and Orange faced each other for the sixth time in seven seasons. In 2016, the two sides faced off in a dramatic 2nd round match in Eden where Morehead won the final match at heavyweight to advance.

However, Tuesday night wasn’t nearly as dramatic. Donald Hicks pulled a surprising pin over Nate Lowe at 2:55, and the Panthers never looked back. Heavyweight Daylan Alston edged Marcus Griffin 3-2. Alston scored the only takedown early in the third period, which proved to be the margin of victory.

After Kessel Summers received a forfeit victory, Orange led 15-0. Mitchell Askew followed with a technical fall over Aaron Marriot 15-0. Gavin Wiggins, wrestling at 120, scored a major decision over Alberto Martinez 10-1 to push Orange’s lead to 30-0. Bailey Hawkins, in his final match at OHS Gym, got another technial fall against D’Ante Richardson 16-1.

Avery Jenkins clinched the match for Orange by pinning Tyler Horton at 160 in :40. Josiah Ramirez, also in his final match at Orange, pinned Zachary Baumann in :49. At 195, Orange’s Braden Homsey remained undefeated with a forfeit victory.

Earlier in the night, Orange defeated Gray’s Creek 62-7. Homsey, Alston, and Jenkins all scored pins. At 170, Francisco McKinley, the kicker for the Orange football team, pinned Leo Walsh in 1:31. At 182, Chandler Howard pinned Hunter Cunningham iin 2:45. Summers, Hicks and Askew earned forfeit wins. Hawkins defeated Ethan Maguin 12-0, while Wiggins also scored a major decision against Zachary Grierson 19-5.

Orange will face Cape Fear in the quarterfinals on Thursday. The location and time for that match will be announced Wednesday morning. The regional championship will also take place Thursday night.

It was a hectic day for Orange Wrestling on Tuesday. Grapplers and coaches awakened to learn school was canceled because of snow, meaning the first round of the state dual team playoffs was seemingly postponed. However, after receiving permission to go on with the matches, Orange emerged with victories over Gray’s Creek and Morehead to advance to the 3A state quarterfinals. It will be Orange Wrestling Coach Spenser Poteat’s first trip to the state quarterfinals, where the Panthers will face undefeated Cape Fear on Thursday.

113-pound Senior Mitchell Askew wrestled his final two matches at Orange High Gym on Tuesday night. He won via forfeit against Gray’s Creek, then scored a technical fall over Aaron Marriot of Morehead 16-1. Askew will be a vital piece of the puzzle of Orange wants to advance past Cape Fear on Thursday night. The Colts are undefeated on the season after winning both its matches at Western Harnett on Tuesday to advance to the State Quarterfinals.

Scoring a pin in his last match at Orange High Gym was a fitting finale for Josiah Ramirez, who defeated Zachary Baumannn in :49 on Tuesday night. But it was only another step towards a series of goals that will unfold over the next week for Ramirez, a 182 pound senior. First, he wants to lead Orange to the state team championship this weekend in Greensboro. To advance that far, Orange will have to win two matches on Thursday at a location to be determined. Ramirez is now 29-1 on the season.

Donald Hicks found himself with big shoes to fill as he entered his first season as a starter on the Orange Wrestling team. He replaced Payton Wilson at 220 pounds after Wilson left midway through his senior season to enroll at N.C. State early. Wilson captured the 3A State Championship last season. On Tuesday night, Hicks pinned Morehead’s Nate Lowe in 2:55. Hicks also earned a forfeit victory in the 1st round of the state playoffs vs. Gray’s Creek.

The surprise snowfall in northern Orange County led to yet another snow day at Orange and Cedar Ridge on Tuesday. It also will send the local basketball teams to play a lot of games in a short amount of time.

Cedar Ridge will play three tripleheader in three days, starting Thursday night. The Cedar Ridge Red Wolves game at Northern Durham, set for Tuesday, was moved to Thursday night. Cedar Ridge’s scheduled nonconference game against Sanderson, scheduled for Wednesday, has been canceled.

On Friday night, the Red Wolves will host East Chapel Hill. Then on Saturday, they host Northwood. It stands to be a crucial stretch for the Cedar Ridge girls team, coming off a topsy turvy week where they defeated Chapel Hill and Southern Durham, only to lose to Orange at home. The Red Wolves are 5-3 in the Big 8, tied in the loss column with Chapel Hill. After the loss to Orange, CRHS is two games behind Southern Durham and Hillside for 1st.

Orange will play three doubleheaders in three days. They start with a road game against Northern Durham on Wednesday night. Orange travels to Northwood on Thursday. That game was supposed to be played on Tuesday, but was moved due to the snow. On Friday, the Panthers host Chapel Hill.

Orange Wrestling’s 16 consecutive Big 8 Conference Championship will direct them to an opening round matchup against a familiar face on Tuesday night.

The Panthers will face Grey’s Creek in the opening round of the 32-team 3A state dual team playoffs on Tuesday night at Orange High starting at 6. Orange defeated Gray’s Creek last February in Hope Mills to win the Eastern Regional Championship. This season, the Bears are 11-7.

If Orange wins over Grey’s Creek on Tuesday, they will face either Eden Morehead or Franklinton in the 2nd round that same night. In 2016, Morehead and Orange had a classic match in the 2nd round of the state playoffs which saw Morehead rally from a 12-0 deficit to defeat the Panthers 31-29. The entire match boiled down to the final bout at heavyweight, where Morehead’s George Blackstone defeated Orange’s Daylan Alston 13-3 to advance to the round of 8. Four days later, Morehead claimed the state championship by beating Enka 39-30.

The entire bracket can be viewed here. 

If Orange and Morehead (also nicknamed the Panthers) do meet, it will be the sixth time in seven years they’ve squared off in the state playoffs.

Orange is the defending Eastern Regional Champion. They fell to Piedmont last season in Monroe in another dramatic final which came to the final bout. Piedmont (32-1) is the top seed from the Southern Carolina Conference.

The regional semifinals and finals will take place on Thursday at a location to be determined. This year, the state championship meet will take place at the Greensboro Coliseum Fieldhouse, the home of the Greensboro Swarm of the NBA Gatorade League. In recent years, the state championship has been held at a host team’s gymnasium. In 2017, the 3A final was held at Piedmont High.

Orange will go into the state playoffs with a 18-0 record. This year, the East Region appears much deeper than in year’s past, complete with undefeated Cape Fear (13-0) and Western Harnett (20-0). In the West Region, Southwest Guilford is 19-1, with its only loss coming in November against Orange. It was the closest OHS has come to tasting defeat this season.

Cedar Ridge Coach Clay Jones sat back looking at the scorebook, sitting on a table while sipping a Diet Coke with chuckling with his assistants.

“We were due,” said Jones after Cedar Ridge had defeated its crosstown rival Orange for the first time since February 2015. But he wasn’t talking about the rivalry against their crosstown rivals.

Cedar Ridge is now 4-13, but it could easily be better. On Wednesday night, the Red Wolves shot 67% from the field, led Southern Durham 62-49 going into the fourth quarter, only to watch the Spartans roar back and win 73-72.

Two Fridays ago, Hillside edged the Red Wolves 60–59. In both games, Cedar Ridge had a shot to. Win at the end, but fell short. Though they started 1-10 and Jones privately admitted to reporters in November that they were looking up at everyone else in the Big 8, his team has never stopped fighting.

That was crystal clear on Friday night. Though the Panthers didn’t have guards Mekai Holt (suffered an injured foot against Hillside) and Mitch Portman (suffered a concussion against Hillside when he took a knee to the head), they were still the same team that had defeated the Red Wolves seven straight times.

Cedar Ridge came away with a convincing 55-38 victory. Terrence Crawford added 13 points while John Vaughn added eleven.

Without Portman and Holt, Orange Coach Greg Motley essentially started guard Joey McMillian with three forwards and center Kendall Whitted. Ryan Sellers, usually a power forward, was slotted as a point guard. Marquis Phelps had a hot hand early, showing surprising range when he knocked down two jumpers as Orange bolted out to a 12-5 lead following a three-pointer from McMullin.

In the second quarter, Crawford took over the game with a three-pointer, followed by another trey from Mekai Collins, who finished with a game-high 20 points. The Cedar Ridge defense held Orange to six points in the second quarter. To end the first half, Red Wolf reserve Braxton Mergenthal threw up a reverse layup where he wasn’t even looking at the basket that fell through the next at the buzzer, giving Cedar Ridge a 23-18 halftime lead and sending the Red Wolves student section into a frenzy.

Collins and Crawford opened the third quarter with consecutive three-pointers to push the Red Wolves advantage to 29-18, and it stayed in double digits the rest of the way.

Cedar Ridge (4-13, 2–6 in the Big 8) will return to action at Northern Durham on Tuesday. Orange. (8-10, 3-5), which has lost five of its last six, travels to Northwood on Tuesday.

ORANGE: Marquis Phelps 5, Ryan Sellers 10, Kendall Whitted 2, Morgan Paschall 5, Joey McMullin 8, Eli Haithcock 1, Matt Atherton 5, Zion Pettiford 2.

CEDAR RIDGE: Khalil Barnett 9, Terrence Crawford 13, John Vaughn 11, Mekai Collins 20, Braxton Mergenthal 2.

Rivalry games aren’t supposed to make sense.

On Friday night, the Orange girls basketball team rolled into Cedar Ridge winless for 2018. They had lost six consecutive conference games, including a 46-39 decision to the Red Wolves on December 19th at Orange. The Panthers were 72 hours removed from a 49-27 loss to Hillside.

On the other hand, Cedar Ridge had five of its last six. On Wednesday night, they handed Southern Durham its first Big 8 loss of the season, rallying from a seven-point deficit with 5:12 remaining to beat the Spartans 49-43.

Leading 16-14 at the half, it appeared Cedar Ridge was set to pull away in the opening minutes of the second half. Center Grace Davies opened the third quarter with a three-point play, followed by a three-pointer from Madison Wardlow to push its lead to 22-14.

And as quickly as that lead came, it disappeared.

The Lady Panthers held the Red Wolves to nine points in the final 13 minutes, including only three field goals. Icez Barnett and Lauren Cates took over the offensive load for Orange, combining for 13 points in the second half as Orange (6-12, 2-6) upset the Red Wolves 39-31 at Red Wolves Gymnasium.

Barnett paced Orange with 13 points, while Cates finished with ten. Logan Woody led Cedar Ridge with nine points. But the most impressive job came from the Orange defense, who held Cedar Ridge center Yolanda Simpson to three points. Simpson came into the game with consecutive double-doubles earlier in the week against Chapel Hill (16 points and 12 rebounds) and Southern Durham (13 points and eleven rebounds).

Simpson’s only points came on three free throws in the fourth quarter. Barnett took a pass from Grace Dively and scored on a lay-in while drawing a foul to tie the game at 27 with 4:32 remaining. Orange got the ball on a held ball, leading to Cates giving Orange the lead for good with a three-pointer from the wing. After Cedar Ridge committed consecutive turnovers, Barnett scored on a three-point play to extend the Lady Panther lead to 32-26 with 2:40 left.

Cedar Ridge’s only field goal in the final five minutes came from Woody, who scored in the final minute after Orange had opened up a seven-point lead.

Dively had the hot hand for the Panthers in the first quarter, scoring six points. Woody struck back for Cedar Ridge with seven points in the first half, including five in the second quarter.

While Orange reveled in the upset, it greatly hampered the Red Wolves chances of catching Southern and Hillside for first place in the Big 8. After its upset of Southern on Wednesday, the Red Wolves were just one game back of first place.

Cedar Ridge (11-7, 5-3) travels to Northern Durham on Tuesday. Orange heads to Northwood Tuesday night at 6.

ORANGE 39, CEDAR RIDGE 31

ORANGE: Grace Dively 7, Icez Barnett 13, Lauren Cates 10, Janea Myers 4, Grace Andrews 3, Nashyra Wilkins 2.

CEDAR RIDGE: Grace Davies 5, Yolanda Simpson 3, Taylin Jean 2, Madison Wardlow 8, Logan Woody 9, Natalia Garay 4.

It took nearly three years, but Mekai Collins finally got his win over Orange on Friday night. Collins scored 20 points as the Red Wolves pulled away to beat their crosstown rivals 55-38. Collins scored 15 points in the second half, continuing a strong week. On Wednesday, Collins scored 16 points in a 73-72 loss to Southern Durham, a game where the Red Wolves shot 67% from the field.