Lower baskets. Younger players. Same intensity.
Parents, families and other fans packed the Camp Verde Community Center gymnasium Thursday, Dec. 3, to watch Little TCB and the Furious Knights take home the fall Grasshopper League championships in games as electric as any basketball rivalry — after a season that raised more than $2,000 for the new Camp Verde library.
Scoring was down in the two evening games, but excitement was high after Wasilva Lewis buried a 10-foot baseline jumper on a 9-foot basket with less than 27 seconds left to eke out a 14-13 victory for head coach Jamie Valles’ fifth straight Grasshopper title with his first- and second-grade team.
On a basket a foot higher, Camp Verde Elementary School fourth-grader Eduardo Acosta followed that up with the evening’s most impressive performance, scoring 12 points to carry the second-seeded Fighting Knights to a 26-10 win over the Warriors.
Little TCB
In the rubber match between the 5-1 top seed, Little TCB, and the second-seeded, 4-2, Wildcats, Lewis’ jumper came in the face of furious defense that defined the final minute of play after both teams struggled to score for most of the contest.
“It feels pretty good,” said Valles, a tribal council member for the Yavapai-Apache Nation. “Some of the kids haven’t even played before. It’s their first year playing.
“For them to get first place, their hard work pays off.”
Isaiah, Jace and Jaden Reay all kept the Wildcats in the game with jumpers that gave them a 6-4 lead at the end of the first quarter.
“The kids played hard,” said their grandfather, Wildcats head coach John Reay, a 15-year league coaching veteran. “We had three players that were all pretty balanced, but it just came down to the last few seconds. You couldn’t have asked for a better championship game.”
Defense by Bayley Dykstra and Teya Rhodes kept the Wildcats in the game in the second quarter.
But a three-point play the old-fashioned way by Lewis from the baseline gave Little TCB a three-point lead at halftime, one they would never relinquish.
“I enjoy teaching them,” Valles added. I have a daughter who’s in fifth grade, and I’ve coached her since she was 2.”
Fast-break buckets and tight second-half defense by TCB’s Kynoe Honwytewa, Jakobe Jackson and Peyton Valles kept the Wildcats at bay.
Furious Knights
Two buckets by Isaac Gagnon began a 10-0 third-quarter run by the Knights, the second seed in the Grasshopper league for third- and fourth-graders, that put the game out of reach.
“It feels awesome,” said first-year head coach Jimi Vasquez. “I was really thinking we might not make it, but it feels good.”
After a low-scoring first half, the Knights controlled the glass to maintain a two-point lead over the third-seeded Warriors, which came into the game with an identical record to the Knights.
Slippery fast Jordan Williams was the key at guard to the three-game sweep of the Warriors, darting in front of passes for steals and making up-and-under moves near the hoop.
“They tried their hardest,” said Corie Perez, filling in at head coach for husband Joseph Perez, who couldn’t attend the game due to work commitments. “They showed great sportsmanship. They did excellent.”
Julian Perez kept the Warriors in the game with jumpers.
“I think he had to find his spot,” Corie Perez said. “Once he found it, he did good. I think he was a little too nervous, at first.”
The Grasshopper basketball league for fifth- through eighth-graders starts in January. For more information, call the Camp Verde Parks and Recreation department, at 567-0535.
For more photos, please see the Wednesday, Dec. 9, issue of the Camp Verde Journal.
