In the crosstown showdown for the District 3-5A lead at Amarillo High Activity Center on Friday night, the Tascosa Rebels weren’t very gracious guests.
However, leaving the place a mess which the hosts had to clean up, gave them sole possession of the district lead, and they weren’t about to apologize.
Tascosa wasted no time crashing the party hosted by Amarillo High, taking the lead early and refusing to act nice. By the end of the evening, the No. 23 Rebels had soundly beaten the Sandies 64-53 and taken the district lead from their crosstown hosts.
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There are still several games to be played in the regular season, but Tascosa (21-5, 10-1 in 3-5A) left Amarillo High (22-7, 10-2) by making a major statement.
“It’s a big win for our guys,” Tascosa coach Steve Jackson said. “I’m proud of the effort and our enthusiasm and the energy they brought tonight. Amarillo High is as it says on their courtside banners the gold standard for how things go around here, so we knew we were going to have to play one of our best games. Our guys were able to come in here and deliver what we’ve talked about in practice.”
The Rebels jumped in front early, taking an 18-7 lead at the end of the first quarter. They hit four 3-pointers, with Kayvien Blackshere opening the scoring by hitting from beyond the arc.
LaDarius Godbolt continued a big week by scoring eight points in the first quarter, including a pair of threes. For the game, Tascosa hit 10 treys.
“We just talk to out guys about taking good shots and making it work with our offense,” Jackson said. “That’s exactly what we did. Kayvien got us started with a big one and LaDarius followed it up pretty quickly. Our shooting is something which has kind of come around as the season has gone on and historically we haven’t shot the ball here very well.”
On this night though, it was the Sandies who were having trouble shooting in their own gym. They looked out of sync offensively for much of the first half.
Amarillo High did manage to cut the deficit to four in the second quarter, and with Tascosa leading 27-22 at halftime, a good game looked in order. The Rebels, though, had other ideas.
Godbolt took over in the second half, when he scored 17 of his game-high 27 points before fouling out in the fourth quarter. It was his second huge game of the week, as in Wednesday’s 67-65 win over Lubbock Monterey, he carried the team again with 26 points.
“Offensively he’s got a high basketball IQ and plays under control,” Jackson sasid of Godbolt. “He’s kind of a calming force to our offense. Sometimes our guys get themselves a little wound up and getting the ball in his hands kind of settles us back down. He’s always had the capability of being a scorer.”
Tascosa was cruising comfortably in the fourth quarter although Amarillo High made things interesting by cutting the score to 57-50 with just over a minute left. The Sandies were able to get no closer, though.
Blackshere and Jack Corpening both had 11 points for Tascosa. Jax Richards led Amarillo High with 17 points while Patch Parr scored 16 and Rex Riemer added 10.
The Rebels have been succeeding by playing their five starters almost exclusively. Only Demarius Gilmore came off the bench for Tascosa against the Sandies, and Jackson said that’s by design.
“The guys we’re playing with had a good thing going and we didn’t want to disrupt it,” Jackson said. “We just let them stay out there.”