Throughout the season, the Wimberley Texans basketball team had set a couple goals the team wanted to accomplish.
One of those goals was to capture an elusive Bi-District Championship that had eluded Wimberley for the past three years.
Just before their season ended at the hands of the Stafford Spartans, the Texans were able to check one thing off the list.
Behind a 31 point performance from Hayes Pounds, the Wimberley Texans snapped a four year drought of losing in the first round of the playoffs to capture their first Bi-District championship since 2018 defeating the Gonzales Apaches 71-65.
For head basketball coach Mike Whitten, who also won his first playoff game as a head coach, he was proud of the Texans overcoming the initial shock of playing in an intense playoff environment to bring home the win.
“It’s great,” Whitten said. “I’m just proud of the guys. I think we are fairly young, and I’ve been telling them that ‘Hey district is tough and intense and when you hit the playoffs it goes up another notch.’ The first part of the game, they were a little shocked by how hard the other team was playing and getting after it. We made a little adjustment there and bounced back, and I’m just proud of their (Wimberley) resolve to do that.”
Gonzales ran out to a 9-2 lead in the first quarter before the Texans were forced to take a timeout. The Texans then closed out the first quarter on a 13-4 run to take the lead at 15-13.
In the second quarter, Wimberley then took their largest lead of the game up to that point leading the Apaches at 28-19.
But a 11-2 run by Gonzales forced the Apaches back into the game, and the two teams were all tied up at 30-30.
After going back and forth, Wimberley had taken the lead at 36-32 at halftime.
In the third quarter, Wimberey continued to maintain their lead. As Gonzales fought back at every turn, the Texans took a 52-46 lead into the fourth quarter.
The Texans then exploded in the fourth quarter to take their largest lead of the game at 62-53 only for Gonzales to come back once again at 64-60.
But the comeback wasn’t enough as the Texans held on in the final minutes to bring home the 71-65 win and the Bi-District Championship.
Pounds lead the team in scoring with 31 points followed by Thomas Watson with 11 and Miles Scheleder with 10.
Watson, Lane Hennessee and Robbie Ritcher, the trio of post players, kept defending the basket while also nabbing important rebounds to keep Gonzales off the board.
“I just told them to keep fighting,” Whitten said. “Keep battling and keep grinding and keep blocking out. That was a point of emphasis this week… They did a great job of adjusting and pulling that guy from the basket.”
The Texans basketball season came to an end on Friday as they fell to the top ranked Stafford Spartans in a 70-41 loss.
Though the loss was a round less where Wimberley wanted to finish, the Texans completed one of the most historic seasons in program history with quite possibly finishing with the most wins in a single season.
With the loss of only two seniors, including one starter, expect the Texans to be in the hunt for the district championship come 2023.
