It's time for prep basketball season to heat up

Now that all these winter storms have passed - at least for the time being - you can bet there are a lot of prep basketball players, coaches and fans just itching to get back in the gym for some games.

So, who are the teams to beat in the Northern 4A? Good question, because both the Sierra and High Desert boys races promise to be barn burners.

In the Sierra League, Reno is touted as the team to beat in a race could see all seven teams remain in playoff contention until the final weekend.

"It's a pretty wide-open league," Reno coach Eric Swain said. "If you don't compete on any given night, you're not going to win."

Douglas coach Keith Lewis echoed that.

"There's not one team on our schedule that can't beat another," Lewis said. "I don't know if this division has ever been so strong top to bottom. I'm not trying to use an old cliché, but I can honestly say any one of these teams is capable of taking off on a run - we just hope that team's going to be us."

Anything can happen, as was evident last Wednesday when Carson (5-12) surprised highly regarded Hug, 58-53. Reno (8-7), played a highly challenging preseason schedule that included a trip to the Deep South Classic in Atlanta, but the Huskies opened their league season with a 75-45 win over South Tahoe.

Carson coach Bruce Barnes had a chance to watch the Reno-South Tahoe game televised on the Local Sports Program and he was impressed.

"I watched it twice," Barnes said. "They (Reno) shot the lights out. South Tahoe zoned them and, with those perimeter shooters, they had nine or 10 three-pointers (by seven different players), and the impressive thing was they didn't miss many of those shots at all."

Swain couldn't help but chuckle when he heard his former teammate had been scouting.

"I told Bruce, 'That's all I need is for you to get a chance to see us twice,'" said Swain, who played along with Barnes at Carson in the early 1980s. "Bruce does such a good job. Carson has good players, but the injury bug has really bitten them hard. The injuries came early, though, so if they stay healthy the rest of the way, they're going to be tough."

Carson (5-12) returns to action with its homecoming game against North Valleys on Friday, followed by a trip to South Tahoe on Saturday.

"Those are real big games," Barnes said. "The home games are always real important, and North Valleys has been playing well. Their five starters are all averaging in double figures and a couple of them are third-year varsity guys, so they have experience. We saw them play in Las Vegas and they lost to Western 94-93, in regulation, so they can get up and down the floor."

The 30-point loss to Reno was not a true gauge of what South Tahoe (10-7) can do, according to Barnes.

"That's not indicative of what South Tahoe has been doing," he said. "They won their tournament and they were second at the Colfax tournament, so they've obviously had some good wins, and you have to account for (Jared) Wood and (Casey) Curcie because they can shoot so well from the perimeter."

Barnes also hopes to see carryover of momentum from the Hug win.

"The kids feel good about that, so hopefully, this (weather delay) won't throw us out of our rhythm too much, but you can't worry about that too much because everybody's in the same boat," he said.

The Senators did gain one benefit from the postponement of their game at Wooster on Tuesday because guard Kevin Brush (eye) and forward Jack Jacquet (broken finger) appear to be ready to come back off the injury list.

The Douglas game at Reno was postponed on Tuesday night and rescheduled for Jan. 29. The Tigers return to action Friday when they host South Tahoe, followed by a trip to Hug on Saturday.

"I don't know how the kids are going to respond to this (weather)," Lewis said. "One thing we all need to understand, everyone is in the same boat so it's not like one team has an advantage over another. It did help by giving us a few extra practices, especially after playing as many games as we did in December. We played 12 games in 16 days, so this has given us a chance to iron out some of the things we needed to work on."

Due to the number of snow days in Washoe County, Swain said his team has missed a lot of practice time in the past week.

"We missed last Monday and Tuesday ... we missed Friday, Saturday and Sunday ... and we had to get special permission to practice yesterday and today," Swain said Tuesday night. "So I think the next couple of games are going to be interesting, just to see what happens after all the time we missed."

In the High Desert League, a good case could be made for Reed, Galena and Bishop Manogue as the teams to beat in the league and for the regional tournament to be held on Feb. 15-19. Reed is 14-1, including a 66-59 overtime win against Manogue last Wednesday.

"That was a helluva game. It was like watching a zone championship game," said Galena coach Tom Maurer, whose team has compiled a 10-5 record while playing in tournaments in Las Vegas and Hawaii.

Galena's boys travel for two games this week, Thursday at Fallon and Saturday at Elko. Next week, the Grizzlies return home to play Damonte Ranch on Tuesday, visit Manogue in a makeup game on Wednesday, visit Reed on Friday and host McQueen on Saturday.

Maurer expects the High Desert League will also be a dogfight overall.

"Reed looked like a zone championship team the other night. Manogue looks really good, Spanish Springs looks good, and if McQueen puts a game together, they're very good."

By the way, the North will send only one boys team and one girls team to the state championships on Feb. 25-26 in Las Vegas, so the regional semifinal and championship games should be real battles. And that's good news, according to Maurer.

"I've always said the reason the South does so well in the state tournament is because they have battles, day-in and day-out, so by the time they get to state they're always battle-proven," Maurer said. "That's the way it is in the North now. Every game is going to be a battle. Those last two nights at the zone tournament, you should see some great games. And whoever comes out of here, I think they're going to represent the North very well at state."

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On the girls side, Reed (10-0) and Reno (10-3) could well be headed toward a rematch of last year's Northern 4A tournament championship game.

Reno was impressive last Wednesday in its 91-22 victory South Tahoe, a game in which Kaylan King hit for seven three-pointers and scored 30 points overall. Douglas should be in the playoff hunt, and the ever-improving Carson Senators were solid in their 51-26 win over Hug.

There's one note to keep in mind in regard to Carson's girls and their postponed game against Wooster on Tuesday night. The game has tentatively been rescheduled for Jan. 29, the same night the Senators are supposed to host Reed in a nonleague game.

• Reed's girls are unbeaten and have been dominant in the process. For example, Reed's closest call to date has been an 18-point win over Douglas. The Raiders captured the championship at McQueen's State Farm Classic, winning four games by an average of 49 points, including a 92-39 win over Shadow Ridge (Las Vegas) in the final.

Fallon (9-3), Galena (9-4) and McQueen (8-7) should also be factors in the playoff picture.

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As for the Northern 3A, Yerington's boys (3-0, 12-1) lead the league coming into a big test tonight at home against Lyon County rival Dayton (1-1, 8-6). This promises to be a good game.

" I have great respect for Rob (Streeter, Dayton coach) and his program," Yerington coach Daron Wildermuth said. "We were kind of on a roll before the break, but we've had a three-week layoff who knows. The talk around the league is that Dayton is the team to beat. Dayton's obviously a quality ball club; they play hard and they play good ball, so we're going to have to bring our 'A' game."

Contact Dave Price at dprice@nevadaappeal.com or call 881-1220.