NEW BRAUNFELS — With an early 7:00 P.M. tip, Chaparral fans quickly got out of Austin and onto the road for the roughly hour drive to New Braunfels, Texas for the Area matchup between Harlan and Westlake.
The Chaps (26-9) defeated the Harlan Hawks (23-10) 64-44 Friday night at Long Creek High School. Westlake senior guard Bo Ogden led the scoring with 29 points. Those quick and smart passes allowed the Chaps to get a lot of “paint touches” according to Lucero but also opened up the game from behind the arc. Odgen got hot from deep and knocked down three threes during the second half. Those threes combined with more twos inside allowed the Chaps to put up 40 points over the last two quarters and clinch the Area Championship.
“We were ready for all their options in the first half,” Lucero said. “But when the [game] starts to go more, you get more familiar with them, and I thought [Westlake] got some stops and then we hit free throws.”
Almost as soon as tipoff happened, the Chaps were on the board with a 3, something that wouldn’t be a staple of the game in the second half. Until then, the Chaps mainly knocked down baskets in the paint.
“We kinda discovered through the game that we could get by them a little bit because of the paint,” Ogden said. “We took advantage of that and got to it.”
The Chaps only mustered 26 points in the first half but it was enough to keep the Hawks at bay by nine points. Ogden and the rest of the Chaps played excellent defense on the Hawks main shooters that included the second-ranked freshman in Texas, 6-foot-6-inch guard/forward London Jackson. Jackson averaged near 20 points a game coming into the matchup but only escaped Ogden’s grasp with a mere nine points.
“No. 5 [Jackson] is a really good shooter,” Lucero said. “You talk about Bo as an offensive player and he wanted to guard him and he did a great job. That’s probably his best two-way game all year.”
After the halftime break the defense remained relentless. With many stops at the basket, the Chaps often fought hard for rebounds which quickly turned into points at the other end of the court. Junior guard Powell Frickenschmidt dished the ball all night long and allowed the teammates around him to make plays.
“Just doing what my coach told me to do,” Frickenschmidt said. “Not trying to do too much, just do what’s right for my teammates, [and] get them open shots.”
The small venue brought immense sound and energy that roared through the arena when either team got rolling.
“All of our district opponents are always kinda like that,” head coach Robert Lucero said. “I think the guys really got used to [loud arenas]. … After about five minutes I thought they really got after it.”
The Chaps face Clemens in the Regional Semifinals round. The winner of that game will be one of the final eight teams remaining in the 6A DII bracket. The Buffaloes average around 60 points a game with about 26 rebounds a game.
“I think we can always get a little bit better execution offensively,” Lucero said. “We can always know our personnel a little bit better or we can always react to the officiating a little better. And so those are things you don’t even need a lot of practice. That’s a lot of mental stuff.”
