Orange Men’s Basketball

This week on the Rodcast, we’re joined by Kyle Snipes. Kyle is an Orange High graduate who grew up in Orange Grove. He went on to Wake Forest, where he was a member of Dave Odom’s staff during the glory days of Wake men’s basketball. Kyle is now the women’s coach at St. Pius High in Atlanta, where he has coached several state championship teams. Kyle discusses his time in Winston-Salem, in Atlanta and his days serving as an umpire with the Hillsborough Youth Athletic Association.

Mia Davidson: The Mississippi State softball team rallied past Central Arkansas 6-3 at Nusz Park in Starkville, MS on Wednesday. UCA led 2-0 at the end of three innings, but Davidson sparked a rally with a triple in the bottom of the fourth. She scored off a groundout by Carter Spexarth. In the 5th, Davidson laced a single to left field to score Candace Denis. It was Davidson’s fourth multi-hit game of the year. Mississippi State improves to 13-3. This weekend, the Bulldogs will host the Alex Wilcox memorial Tournament, which will include UAB, Alcorn State and UT Martin.

Brad Debo: The #8 N.C. State baseball team defeated UNC Wilmington 11-0 in Raleigh on Tuesday night. Debo replaced catcher Patrick Bailey in the ninth inning. He didn’t make a plate appearance.

Icez Barnett: The Division II Chowan women’s basketball team ended the regular season on Tuesday night. Limestone defeated the Hawks 78-72 at the Helms Center in Murfreesboro. After starting the previous three games, Barnett came off the bench and played four minutes. Barnett played 18 games in the regular season. She averaged 9.4 minutes per game. She scored 39 points and grabbed 44 rebounds. Chowan will travel to Belmont Abbey, ranked #10 in Division II, in the opening round of the Conference Carolinas Tournament on Monday.

Kaylen Campbell: The season of the Division III Trinity Bantams ended in the quarterfinals of the New England Small Conference Athletic Conference on Saturday. Williams College defeated Trinity 65-56 in Williamstown, MA. Campbell played three minutes to end her sophomore season. This season, Campbell played 20 games. She averaged 10.9 minutes per game and 2.6 points per game. Trinity ends the year 16-9.

Lauren Cates: The Wake Tech Community College women’s basketball team played its final home game of the season by rolling past South Carolina Faith A&M 107-33 on Monday night in Raleigh. Cates came off the bench to score four points, grab four rebounds and dish out two assists. The Eagles, who are now 17-7, will travel to Louisburg College on Thursday night to finish the regular season.

Bowen Collins: Belmont Abbey men’s lacrosse team, ranked #6 in Division II, defeated the #16 Lenoir Rhyne Bears 12-7 on Friday at Alumni Field in Belmont. Collins assisted on Lenoir Rhyne’s first goal of the game, which was scored by Eric Dickinson. With that goal, Dickinson became the all-time leading goal scorer in South Atlantic Conference history. Collins had five shots, two on net, and one ground ball. The Bears fall to 2-1.

Zach Wright: The Division II Mars Hill men’s lacrosse team defeated Shorter 8-6 at Meares Stadium in Mars Hill on Wednesday night. Wright, a senior who played at Orange, had two shots. On Saturday, the Lions defeated Emmanuel 15-13. Wright scored a goal for the Lions and had two ground balls. Mars Hill is 3-2.

Aidan Poole: The former Cedar Ridge Red Wolf has started the last three games for the Division III Greensboro College Pride. On Wednesday night, Poole started as a defenseman as Greensboro defeated Ferrum 14-11 in Virgina. Poole also started in Greensboro’s 16-3 win over Oglethorpe University at Pride Field on Saturday. Poole scored his second college goal on February 19 in Guilford’s 16-9 win over the Pride. Last season, Poole played in eleven games for the Pride, but didn’t start in any of them.

The potential for snow on Thursday has led the North Carolina High School Athletic Association to postpone the opening round of the State Wrestling Championships.

The Big 8 men’s and women’s basketball tournament, which started on Tuesday, will now have to finish by Saturday–if it finishes at all.

In a statement released by the NCHSAA on its website on Wednesday night, the association postponed the first day of the 2020 individual wrestling state tournament due to the possibility of a wintry mix in the Triad. The tournament, scheduled to begin on Thursday afternoon at the Greensboro Coliseum, is still slated to conclude on Saturday night.

“The NCHSAA Staff is working on a schedule that will still allow the tournament to be completed on Saturday night,” the statement read. “More details and an updated schedule will be released Thursday through the NCHSAA Website and other communication avenues.”

Orange High had three wrestlers scheduled to start competing on Thursday. Brendon Worsham, who finished 2nd in the Mideast Regionals last weekend at Cape Fear High, will take on Justin Bellran of St. Stephens, who came in 3rd in the West Region.

At 126 pounds, Orange’s Kessel Summers will square off with Havelock’s Nate Lucio in the opening round. That will be a rematch from earlier this year. On January 11 in the Havelock Duals, Summers scored a major decision over Lucio 14-5. Summers finished 3rd in the Mideast Regionals.

Xavier Tinnen, seeded 4th, will face Midwest Regional champion Amir Joseph of Parkwood in the opening round. Tinnen, who is 22-8, qualified for the state championship for the first time last weekend after a fourth place finish.

The respective Big 8 basketball tournaments were supposed to resume on Thursday with doubleheaders at Northwood High in Pittsboro and Southern Durham High. Both Chatham County and Durham Public Schools announced on Wednesday night that schools would be closed on Thursday, leading to the postponement of the four scheduled games.

At Southern Durham, third-seeded Chapel Hill will face second-seeded Southern Durham in the women’s game at 6, followed by the men’s game between third-seeded Vance County vs. 2nd-seeded Southern Durham.

The Northwood women’s team is slated to face 5th-seeded East Chapel Hill in the other semifinal at 6 in Pittsboro. At 7:30, the top-seeded Northwood men’s team will host 5th-seeded Chapel Hill.

The postponement means the semifinals are now scheduled for Friday night, and the championship games on Saturday at the higher-seed’s gymnasium. However, the tournament must be completed by Saturday. Another cancellation on Friday likely means the tournament won’t be completed.

If that’s the case, Northwood will be the #1 seed from the Big 8 Conference in both the men’s and women’s tournaments since they won the regular season championship in both races. Southern Durham finished runner-up in both races and would get the #2 seed (normally, the tournament winner would get the #2 seed if it isn’t one of the top two teams).

On Thursday morning, the NCHSAA announced that seeding for the state playoffs would be delayed until Sunday morning.

All four Hillsborough teams were eliminated in the opening rounds of the Big 8 Tournaments on Tuesday. The only local squad with a chance to earn a state playoff spot is the Orange women’s team, who finished 6th in the Big 8 Conference and has a MaxPreps ranking of #59. HighSchoolOT, run by Nick Stevens, has repeatedly had Orange as among the last five teams in the state playoffs in recent projections. If the Lady Panthers make the field of 64, it would be their fourth trip to the state playoffs in the last five years.

In his final regular season game, Joey McMullin saved the best for last. He scored 36 points as Orange defeated Northern Durham 65-56. McMullin shot 13-of-21 from the field, including 7-of-13 from 3-point range. McMullin also pulled down 12 rebounds as the Panthers earned its tenth win of the season. Jason Franklin added 15 for Orange. The Panthers will face Southern Durham in the Big 8 Tournament on Tuesday night at Spartan Gymnasium. Enjoy highlights from the game courtesy of Thompson Team Films.

by Tim Hackett

It was a pretty remarkable way for Joey McMullin to bookend his senior season. Sandwiched in between his first and his final games this season is a lot of tumult he surely wishes were different, but on this February Friday in Durham the Orange senior ended his final regular season the same way he started it back in late November – an outing of better than 35 points on about a half-dozen made three-pointers, lights-out shooting, nearly mistake-free play, and, to top it off, a Panther victory.

Nearly three months after McMullin kickstarted the Panther season with a career-best 38-point performance in Orange’s season opener, McMullin sealed the season with a 36-point effort, keyed by a career-high seven threes, adding in his tenth double-double for good measure, and leading Orange (10-14, 4-10 Big 8) to a 65-56 win over Northern Durham (4-20, 2-12) on Friday night at Poe Gymnatorium. With the win, Orange avoided finishing the year in last in the conference, dooming the Knights to the basement position via their tenth straight loss.

“Joey was super big inside and out tonight,” Orange head coach Derryl Britt said via text postgame. “He put the team on his back and carried us to victory!”

This game was as close as expected in the first half, following an ultra-tight 60-59 Northern win last month in Hillsborough (the Knights’ last win prior to this ten-game losing streak). The Knights scored the final six points of the first half to level the score at 25 apiece going into the break, and scored five of the first seven of the second half to take a 30-27 lead early.

They would not lead again. Orange scored the next 11 points, anchored by a pair of McMullin threes, to pull ahead, and outscored Northern 21-10 over the final six minutes of the frame. Jason Franklin was strong throughout the night for Orange, hitting consecutive threes of his own in that stretch to stake the Panthers to a 48-40 lead after three.

The two thinnest teams in the conference were being tested and going toe-to-toe – both schools sport only ten men on their rosters, and due to injuries and other factors both head coaches really only had eight guys to deploy. And Orange’s depth – or lack thereof – was tested even further when McMullin came up hobbling after he wrenched away a defensive rebound and ran almost literally into the bleachers before hitting the floor in pain. Some Northern trainers taped up his ankle on a table near the Northern bench, but his team soldiered on even with their best player sidelined. JJ Thompson hit a cutting layup. Kendrell Brooks converted a nice spinning floater. And Hunter Burch connected on two stickback layups, part of a career-best four-point day for a guy who had scored just ten points all season. But in the meantime Northern went on a run. They scored in all three phases – Greg Webb from in tight, Torrey Alston from midrange, and Derrien Hicklen from (extremely) deep – and started the fourth quarter on a 9-4 run to pull within 52-49.

Ultimately, McMullin valiantly returned to the game and promptly hit another three – his seventh – and a two shortly thereafter to put Orange back ahead 60-51. With time winding down, Northern tried to foul to preserve the clock, but the Knights had committed so few fouls over the course of the half that it took them forever to force Orange into the bonus. And once the Panthers got there they weren’t able to salt the Knights away, even with Franklin and McMullin, two of the most consistent foul shooters in the conference, tasked with the job. Hicklen pulled yet another deep three out of his bag – we’re talking a shot from around five feet outside the arc – to cut it to 62-56, but the Knights continued to foul McMullin, and he made good down the stretch. Northern forced up one final shot that went offline and – fittingly – into the hands one final time of Joey McMullin to wrap up a 65-56 Panther win.

“He was a beast on the boards,” Britt said of McMullin. “Great all-around game.”

The stakes were quite clear for this regular season finale: lose, and your team finishes in the basement of the Big 8. McMullin and the Panthers did more than enough to ensure that stigma wasn’t stuck onto them. There’s no doubt that 7^th place in this conference will feel loads better than 8^th. Their reward for this effort? Well, it really feels more like the exact opposite of an award – a trip to second-place Southern Durham in the first round of the Big 8 Conference Tournament next Tuesday. It’ll be a tall task against one of the best teams in 3A, but it will give the Panthers one more shot to extend what was once such a promising season. And it will give us one more chance to watch Joey McMullin create the magic he’s made almost all year.  

As usual, the Orange women’s basketball team was short handed on Friday night. This time, it was on Senior Night against Northern Durham. Despite some early offensive problems, the Lady Panthers defeated Northern 45-36 at Panther Gymnasium. Orange trailed 7-6 at the end of the first quarter, but Samantha George hit two key 3-pointers in the second quarter. George raced down the floor in the waning seconds of the third quarter to hit a lay-up at the buzzer. It was a special night for senior Brenna Mehl, who played her final game at Orange High. Mehl hit the first jump shot of the game. Brenna has a 4.6 grade point average and plans to study biomedical engineering at UNC or N.C. State. She has also been accepted at Notre Dame. The Orange women end the regular season 11-11, despite playing most of the year without sophomore Mary Moss Wirt, who was the only returning starter from last year. Orange will travel to Chapel Hill for the opening round of the Big 8 Conference Tournament on Tuesday night at 7.

The Orange men’s basketball team defeated Chapel Hill on Monday night. Joey McMullin and Jason Franklin led the Panthers to its ninth win of the season. Orange also completed a season sweep of the Tigers. Enjoy highlights of the game from Thompsonteamfilms.com.