By Michael Cignoli (For OzarksSportsZone.com)
SPOKANE – You could make a reasonable case that the Ash Grove boys basketball team is still riding the momentum it gathered from winning the Spokane Invitational tournament last January.
The Pirates show no signs of slowing down anytime soon.
Tournament MVP Brady Nicholson scored 22 points and the Pirates used a colossal game-opening run and yet another solid defensive effort to score a 50-38 victory over the hosts in the 38th Annual Spokane Invitational title game on Saturday night.
Ranked third in the state among Class 2 schools, Ash Grove opened the game on a 14-0 run and never let the Owls cut their lead below six points en route to a wire-to-wire victory.
The Pirates improved to 15-3 on the season, with none of those losses coming against in-class opponents. They are now 26-4 since the beginning of last January’s Spokane Invitational, which touched off a run that led them to their first outright conference championship since 1985 and first district title since 2014.
The Pirates hope defending their tournament title will lead to similar late-season success this year.
“Last year, it really jump-started us into conference — which we ended up winning — and then it jump-started us into the district,” Nicholson said. “We just continued winning all throughout until we lost in sectionals. Hopefully, this year we’ll go beyond that and win out.”
The Pirates lost just two starters from last season’s historic team, but they’ve dropped from Class 3 to Class 2 and have only lost to Class 6 Ozark, Class 5 No. 9 Bolivar and Class 3 No. 8 Sparta as they head into the heart of their Southwest Conference schedule.
“When you can come to a tournament against a couple of really good teams – and not just good teams, but different kinds of teams. Teams that are very physical and have those big guys, it kind of sets the tone for your toughness going forward,” Pirates coach Grant Williamson said. “And when you get into conference play late in the season and everybody knows who you are and you know who they are, it really comes down to execution. It comes down to toughness. And those things are what it takes to win late in the season and what it takes to win district championships, which is really our goal. So tournaments like this one really springboard us into those opportunities.”
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The Pirates, who were the tournament’s top seed, didn’t allow the second-seeded Owls to score until senior JD Tate dropped the first two of his team-high 17 points with 1:40 remaining in the opening quarter.
That made the score 14-2, but the Owls battled back to trim Ash Grove’s lead to 15-6 at the end of the first quarter and 24-16 at the halftime break.
“I don’t know what happened,” Spokane coach Newt Starrett said of his team’s start. “I think it’s a combination of maybe a little bit of nerves and not hitting some shots and a couple bounces maybe not going our way, but when that happens you just have to fight like we did.”
Tate opened the second half with another bucket to pull the Owls within six, but the Pirates responded with an 11-3 run to go ahead 35-21 — fully restoring their 14-point game-opening lead.
But the Owls weren’t done yet.
Spokane got back-to-back 3-pointers from Wiley Armitage to again cut the deficit to six with 5:19 to play in regulation, but the Pirates stormed right back with another 11-3 run of their own.
Nicholson, Asher Rust and Brock Mooneyham all hit key shots as Ash Grove turned a 39-33 lead into a 50-36 advantage – once again tying their huge lead from the start of the night.
“When you’re fighting and you’re clawing and you’re back that much and you have to scrap for every point you get, I think at times we got a little bit tired here and there,” Starrett said. “They were able to run out and get an open layup or make a big shot here or get fouled and make two free throws. Credit to them. We came out and were trying to pressure them real hard and heavy and they made good passes to open people and didn’t turn the ball over. And they did what they had to do. It’s tough when that happens, but it’s something that we can learn from and we can push forward and hopefully take with us through our conference (schedule) here and take with us into districts.”
Armitage finished with 11 points for Spokane, which fell to 8-11.
Rust had 11 and Mooneyham chipped in eight for Ash Grove, which also hopes to apply the lessons learned from this tournament to its playoff push.
There wasn’t anything particularly earth-shattering or revolutionary the Pirates discovered during the week, but the end result did reinforce something they’ve been preaching all season.
The Pirates are seldom the tallest team on the court – only one starter (Nicholson, 6-foot-3) is more than six feet tall, and he gave up five inches to the 6-foot-8 Tate.
But they’ve continually won games with staunch defense efforts, and Saturday was no different.
“If one thing stands out to me, it’s our guys’ heart on the defensive end,” Williamson said. “I thought we were undersized and probably underathleticismed — if that’s a word — and we really defended well. We held them to 38 points. We missed a lot of easy shots and we were able to overcome that because of how we defended.”
The Pirates held all three of their tournament opponents – Bradleyville, Reeds Spring and the Owls – to 40 or fewer points. In Ash Grove’s 18 games this season, only seven teams have scored at least 42 points against them.
“While we like to think we’re an offensive team, we really hang our hat on the defensive end,” Williamson said. “It’s something we work on every day and our guys have really bought in, which has really allowed us to see the success that we’ve had.”
Ash Grove improved to 38-7 since the beginning of the 2021-22 season, a near-total reversal from the 11-37 record the team posted between November 2019 and February 2021.
Four of those seven losses have come during the last two Blue & Gold Tournaments, meaning the Pirates have won 36 of their last 39 games played outside that setting.
“The culture in the program right now is awesome,” Williamson said. “Guys love to be a part of it. We have a lot of freshmen and sophomores who don’t get any of the recognition on varsity nights, but they’re every bit as much a part of it and bought in to what we’re doing. Success definitely breeds success and we’ve had some really good players that have helped kind of turn things around and bought into what we’re doing. If I had to sum up our program right now in one word, it’d be fun. Guys really just enjoy being a part of it and when guys like what they do, they work hard and compete tough. Then I think the results just kind of fall in line.”
ALL-TOURNAMENT TEAM
FIRST TEAM
Brady Nicholson, Ash Grove (MVP)
JD Tate, Spokane
Taylor Calzaretta, Reeds Spring
Logan Isbell, Blue Eye
Brendyn Paulsen, Southwest
SECOND TEAM
Aidan Cook, Cassville
Jace Leigh, Spokane
Caden Wiest, Reeds Spring
Asher Rust, Ash Grove
Ricky Riott, Spokane
HONORABLE MENTIONS
Brock Mooneyham, Ash Grove
Brett Scarbrough, Bradleyville
