Roland ends regular season with losses; RHS senior reaches 1,000 points

The 2023-24 high school basketball regular season did not end the way the Roland High School teams had hoped.

The Running Rangers not only saw a 13-game winning streak snapped last week, but ended the final week of the regular season with a threegame losing skid which coincided with the Roland boys not at 100 percent due to injuries.

“DaVohn (Hall) has been hurt a little bit,” Roland boys coach Eddie Lewis said. “He’s not at full speed yet.”

After the Roland boys suffered a 61-51 road loss Feb. 6 against Checotah to end the winning streak, the Running Rangers fell 57-54 to Inola in Inola on Thursday night. On Saturday at the Ranger Dome, the Stilwell Indians avenged their home loss to Roland with a 53-38 victory — which made the Running Rangers and the Indians co-NOAA Conference champions.

The Lady Rangers ended last week — and regular season — with backto- back losses, losing a 43-33 road game to Inola on Thursday night and falling 57-49 to Stilwell on Saturday night at the Ranger Dome.

In the girls’ loss to Inola, the Lady Longhorns broke a 7-all tie after the first quarter with a 14-4 second period to take a 21-11 lead into the locker rooms at halftime. Inola would pretty much keep the lead at 10 points throughout the second half.

In defeat, Halle Freeman led the Lady Rangers (17-6 overall, 6-4 in NOAA Conference play) with 19 points, followed by Nelke with seven points, Medicine Bird and Kynlei Earnhart with three points each and Haven Freeman with a free throw.

In the boys’ loss to Inola, the ’Horns trailed 40-29 after three periods but doubled the Running Rangers 28-14 in the fourth quarter to get the come-from-behind win.

In defeat, Wiggins scored a game-high 21 points to lead Roland, followed by Kade Shook with 11 points, Mason Kemp with seven points, Hall and Cason Perryman with five points each, Buck Triplett with three points and Paul Johnson with two points.

In the girls’ loss to Stilwell, the Lady Indians built as much as a 25-point lead at 45-20 on a 3-point basket by Stilwell’s Kayla Benham with 49 seconds left in the third quarter. However, the Lady Rangers made a furious comeback in the final period, getting their deficit to as small as three points at 49-46 with 1:47 left to play on a basket by Haven Freeman, but that was as close as Roland got.

“That’s kind of what we did at Stilwell (on Dec. 1) — we dug ourselves a hole,” Roland girls coach Scott Nelke said. “We’ve matured since then. We battled back. They could have laid down, but they didn’t. We’ve just got to do some things better against better teams. That team (Stilwell) is probably a state (tournament) playoff team. In the second half, I thought we did things better in the second half. I’m proud of them.”

In defeat, Earnhart scored a game-high 16 points to lead Roland, followed by Haven Freeman with nine points, Medicine Bird with eight points, Nelke with seven points, Halle Freeman with five points and Brooklyn Hallbauer with two points.

In the boys’ loss to Stilwell, a conventional three-point play by Wiggins, who was honored prior to the game for reaching 1,000 points in his high school career, to put the Running Rangers (19-4, 8-2) ahead 10-6 with 3:54 left in the opening period, but the Indians ended the quarter with a 9-2 run to take a 15-12 lead into the second period. Stilwell never lost the lead thereafter.

“I thought we played hard,” Lewis said. “We didn’t have some shots fall, but we were like 3-of-10 on free throws. They (the Indians) were hot, hitting like three or four 3s in the first half, then we’d go down and shoot free throws and miss them. If you can make a run, you can stay in the game. We went like 0-for-5 there. I thought that was a big key (in the loss). Stilwell played really well and made some big plays. We won enough games to get a share of the (NOAA) conference (title).”

In defeat, Wiggins scored 12 points and Shook added 10 points to lead Roland, followed by Triplett with nine points, Raesean Perryman with three points and Hall and Kemp with two points apiece.

Since the Oklahoma Secondary Schools Activities Association (OSSAA) awarded the Roland teams a bye through the district tournament, the Lady Rangers and Running Rangers will be idle until the Class 3A Regional Tournament, which will take place Feb. 22-24 at the Ranger Dome, with the Roland teams playing at 6 and 7:30 p.m. against the winners of the Class 3A District Tournament between Westville and Heavener, which will take place Friday night at Heavener.

Lewis was disappointed that his team will not get to play in a district tournament at the end of this week.

“I would rather play this week than take a full week off,” Lewis said. “We’re going to be off a week and a half. Who knows what will happen. If the kids work hard (during the time off), we’ll come back and be just fine.”

On the other hand, after ending the season on a twogame losing streak, Nelke believes the time off before the Class 3A Regional Tournament will be beneficial to his team.

“You don’t ever want to end on a two-game losing streak,” Nelke said, “but when you play (Class) 4A No. 5 and No. 6, that’s a possibility that it can happen. We approached these two games as we’re trying to get better. It might be what it will look like in the playoffs. This week we’ll get back healthy and get some time off. We’re kind of looking at getting back out there on that practice floor for a bit.”