By John Loop
Sports Writer
It was a valiant effort.
But the Coppell Cowboys fell just short of a comeback on Tuesday night against the McKinney Lions.
Junior post Simi Socks, who finished with 21 points on the night, battled McKinney senior Raynell Denny up and down the floor the entire game.
Denny seemed to get the best of the Cowboys on both ends of the court, totaling 21 points, as well as rebounding the basketball and blocking two shots on defense.
The first quarter started off strong for the Cowboys as junior Josh Feitl, who has seen his playing time increase over the last few games, scored the first four points of the game. Feitl finished with 11 points.
The Cowboys have been a strong team out of the gate in the first quarter this season, but McKinney made them pay, clawing their way back to narrow the Cowboy lead to two at 14-12 at the end of the quarter.
Suprisingly, no Cowboy player was called for a foul in the first period of play. As the second quarter began, things got a little more complicated. McKinney guards Jonathan Shannon and Connor Fuentes started getting in the lane with their dribble penetration skills. With Denny taking feeds from both senior guards, the Lion “triangle” offense became harder and harder to stop.
Shannon scored 16 points while Fuentes finished with nine for the Lions.
Six first-half fouls were called against Coppell, all in the second quarter and McKinney was awarded six free-throw attempts. The Lions only cashed in on 2-of-6, because of a Kwame Brown-like act by the Lions’ senior forward Tracy Miles. Miles went 0-for-4 after a lane violation on his first set of freebies, earned him two more. Miles missed all four.
Coppell was lucky to head into the locker room with a two-point lead at 28-26.
The second half started almost the opposite that the Cowboys would have wanted. Errant passes, lazy defense, and careless fouls sparked a Lions run that had Coppell down at the end of the quarter by six heading into the final period of play.
“We knew we had to find the energy to get back even,” Coppell head coach Kit Pehl said. “This team is very resilient when they are down in games, so I knew we had the ability to, at least try to get back in the game.”
Whatever Pehl said during the quarter break worked. Junior guard Brandon Watson scored 10 clutch points in a key stretch for the Cowboys. Watson’s three pointer just after the quarter began helped put the momentum back on the home team’s side.
“It felt good leading that late rally,” Watson said. “I just wish it had not been that late in the game.”
Watson, and Socks who scored six points, all in the lane under Denny’s guard, pulled the Cowboys back to within two points with 30 seconds remaining on the game clock.
“It was tense, trading baskets like that,” Pehl said. “I think we would have loved to get a defensive stop on one of those possessions to put ourselves in a situation to win, but it just did not happen.”
With 10 seconds left, and after a myriad of timeouts called by both teams, McKinney got Fuentes on the free throw line with the chance to put the game away for good. Unlike the previous attempts, the senior guard nailed both shots to seal the Lion victory.
Closing out close games has been a theme all season. In games decided in six points or less, including Tuesday’s loss, Coppell is a dismal 5-4.
“We are the ones who put ourselves in the best position to win games, but ultimately we just cannot close them out,” Watson said.
