Cy-Lakes advance to the second round of the playoffs for the first time in the school’s five-year history
Aldine – In the first game of a doubleheader at the Campbell Center, Cy-Lakes got off to a 25-5 first-quarter lead, connected on ten first-half 3-pointers to take advantage of a 44-20 halftime lead, and coasted to a 68-54 5A Region III Bi-District win over second-year school Aldine Davis.
With the win, the Spartans advance to the Area Round of the playoffs where it will face Bellaire, a 41-28 winner over Katy, on Friday.
Cy-Lakes (26-4) in the playoffs for the fourth consecutive season picked up its first postseason victory in its fifth season of existence.
“We’ve had some good teams here, but this team is resetting the bar,” Cy-Lakes coach Jeff Snedeker said. “I think we have the talent to go pretty far. This is our fourth straight year in the playoffs.”
Yuvi Kang led four Spartan’s in scoring with 20. Derrick Thompson scored 12, Nick Garth chipped in 11 and De’Aaron Fox added 10.
Despite the victory came at the cost of Davis (9-10), the future is bright for the young Mustangs, which out-scored Cy-Lakes 34-24 in the second half with a team made up of two freshmen, two juniors and ten sophomores.
Coach Smith will count on a young experienced team next season, including a pair of unnamed players, a 6’7″ freshman and a 6’8″ sophomore.
“It’s our first time in the playoffs and they jumped on us early,” says Davis coach Zeke Smith. Once we got the nerves out it was a ball game. The first seven minutes was tough on us. The rest of the game was fairly equal. We may have scored a little more.
Cameron Crowe led the Mustang with 11 points.
The fact of facing a pressing defense was fine with the Mustangs, who also sport an up-tempo style transition game.
“We knew at least initially they would try to press us but we’re fine with that and as you saw in the first half we had no problem running with them”, explained Snedeker.