A regular season that can be described as a roller coaster came to an end for Sedona Red Rock High School’s boys basketball team on Friday, Feb. 7.
Sedona led early in its game against Northland Prep. But with starting point guard junior Carlos Parra- Landaverde and top scorer senior Jackson Coughlin still sidelined, the Scorpions eventually fell 64-55 to the host Spartans.
“It was a pretty good game to have without two of your starters,” SRRHS coach George Gleason said. “We didn’t play too bad. We had a really awesome first quarter then hit a dry spell again and started missing layups. It was a good back-and-forth basketball game. They got up 15 then we got down to within four. We needed to make our free throws and layups, and we had a hard time with that.”
The bad news for Sedona is that the regular season ended with a loss. Fortunately for the Scorpions, there is still likely more basketball to play.
While SRRHS won’t know for sure until Thursday, Feb. 13, the Scorpions remain in good position to finish in the top 24 in the Division 2A standings, which would be good enough for a play-in game. Sedona was seeded No. 20 prior to the Northland Prep game. While the Scorpions did lose, the teams below them in the standings did as well.
While the Scorpions are in a good position to make a play-in game, the road to that game will be a long one. For starters, SRRHS will be playing on the road. And while some of Sedona’s potential opponents are in the Phoenix area, other potential trips — like St. Johns and San Manuel — are much longer.
“If we end up close to home that would be great,” Gleason said. “But no matter what we’ll be travelling somewhere.”
A postseason trip being possible at this point of the year shows how far the Scorpions have come since the season’s early games. Sedona struggled early in the year, which can largely be attributed to two things. One, the 2A Scorpions played a lot of opponents from Division 3A and higher. Two, aside from players like Coughlin and fellow senior Frank Alves, the SRRHS team was largely young and inexperienced.
As the season progressed, though, Sedona began to play more within its own region and did well, going 7-5. Gleason highlighted the improvement of juniors like Joey Johnson, Jaiah Grondin and Lee Loughnane as a major factor in the Scorpions improving through the season.
“I feel great about them,” Gleason said. “I’m really proud of them. They’ve really come together and I’m really proud of them. They’ve come a long way. We’re in every game for the most part and we’re fun to watch. We play a fun game which I told them we need to do in Sedona. You don’t want to be at your best midway through the season, you want to be at your best right now. And I think we’re close to that.”
Assuming the Scorpions do make the play-in game, it will be played on Wednesday, Feb. 19 on the road. If Sedona wins, it will advance to the State Championship Tournament, which will begin on Friday, Feb. 21 with the Round of 16 and the quarterfinals coming the following day. Both of those games would be in Prescott.
If the Scorpions advanced out of those games, they’d move to the state semifinals and finals, which would be played on Friday, Feb. 28 and Saturday, Feb. 29 in Phoenix.
