This article by Cody Eliot was posted in the February 24, 2020, edition of the Daily News-Record. The JV Boys Basketball team also clinched a VIC championship earlier the same day (February 22, 2020), defeating North Cross 62-44.<\/em><\/p>\n
ROANOKE \u2014 Don\u2019t look now, but here comes Eastern Mennonite.<\/p>\n
And it may be a different version of the Flames than we\u2019ve ever seen before.<\/p>\n
Third-seeded Eastern Mennonite \u2014 known for its up-and-down style on offense and sharpshooting ability from 3-point range \u2014 used a second-straight strong defensive effort to defeat top-seeded Covenant 54-39 in the Virginia Independent Conference boys basketball championship at Roanoke College on Saturday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe defense and toughness is what carried us through,\u201d EMHS second-year coach Chad Seibert said. \u201cWe were able to dial that up against North Cross and then carry it through to the Covenant game. We had a bigger lineup and some zone stuff that we had been holding and we threw that out there and I think that really helped us.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Flames and Eagles split their two regular-season meetings with Covenant star and VIC Player of the Year Jonas Sanker scoring 46 in a meeting in Harrisonburg.<\/p>\n
On Saturday, Sanker finished with 13 points and the Eagles finished with just 39 as a team.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s kind of the evolution of our team,\u201d Seibert said. \u201cWe\u2019re obviously offensively talented and we focus a lot on that. You take guys from so many places and try to put the defense together and build the habits required. It\u2019s taken all season, but we\u2019re getting better. We\u2019re getting better every day, which I\u2019m most proud of.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was the first VIC title for Eastern Mennonite since 1994. That\u2019s something Seibert said he emphasized to his players before the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe talked about it yesterday,\u201d Seibert said. \u201cMy pregame speech was brief. We\u2019re talking about the opportunity for us, our kids, our grandkids to walk in there and see that [2020] hanging on a banner. It\u2019ll be there forever. We\u2019ll always be able to look at that and come back to this memory forever. It was very special.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chance Church led the Flames (21-8) with 17 points and four assists and Aviwe Mahlong had 15 points. Adam Hatter continued to be a solid all-around point guard with 10 points, six assists and seven rebounds while Nick Jones had six points and 11 boards and Trey Gillenwater chipped in with six points also.<\/p>\n
After falling in the VIC semifinals a year ago, the Flames went on to play in the Virginia Independent Schools Athletic Association Division III title game.<\/p>\n
Despite that, Seibert said the conference loss was still on their minds.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst and foremost, we wanted the opportunity to compete for it because we fell short last year,\u201d Seibert said. \u201cWe wanted to feel that moment. We felt like once we got there, we\u2019d be prepared. 1994 is a long time ago. None of the kids were alive then and most of my staff wasn\u2019t alive then. It\u2019s not because EMHS didn\u2019t have teams good enough. It\u2019s just that difficult of a task to win the VIC.\u201d<\/p>\n
EMHS will receive a first-round bye in the upcoming VISAA Division III tournament as the No. 3 seed. It\u2019ll host the winner of Amelia Academy and Christ Chapel in the quarterfinal round on Wednesday in Harrisonburg.<\/p>\n
Now, stocked with a renewed focus on the defensive end and a consistent ability to light it up offensively, the Flames are ready for state play.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe held some things back a little bit at the end and that\u2019s always a little bit of a risk as a coach,\u201d Seibert said. \u201cYou want to peak at the right time. It\u2019s not like there\u2019s a blueprint for that. It comes and goes with each team. We feel good about where we are and what our identity has become and where our focus is right now.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This article by Cody Eliot was posted in the February 24, 2020, edition of the Daily News-Record. The JV Boys Basketball team also clinched a VIC championship earlier the same day (February 22, 2020), defeating North Cross 62-44. ROANOKE \u2014 Don\u2019t look now, but here comes Eastern Mennonite. And it may be a different version\u2026<\/p>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":27203,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[79],"tags":[33,133],"class_list":["post-27197","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-athletics","tag-basketball","tag-emhs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27197"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27197\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.easternmennonite.org\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27197"}],"curies":[{"name":"gracias","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}