Part 1: A look back at our state teams

How old am I?

I remember a time when Haley (Myers) Mitchel and Mallory (Markus) Kusik used to corner me and question - nay, grill - me as to why their seventh grade games weren’t getting more space in the newspaper.

A couple years later, I was covering their teams’ excellent seasons and subsequent runs to the state tournament.

Here were are some…. well, let’s just say a few…. years later and both were a part of magical journeys to their respective state tournaments, but as coaches.

When they say the days are long, but the years are short, I know what they mean.

Managing the highs and lows - and the overall emotions - of a team are a part of the coaching game.

A season can be full of them and then the playoffs provide their very own roller coaster with which to deal.

That brings me to the Okarche girls.

Getting within one win of the state tournament through the winner’s bracket can be an exhilarating feeling.

However, that makes the reality of losing your next two games and NOT achieving your goal all the more crushing.

That was the reality of the 2021 season for the Okarche Lady Warriors.

It was also Haley Mitchel’s first season as a head coach.

The team battled multiple layoffs due to COVID - as did everyone else - then its own internal bout with the virus not long before the playoffs.

Still, the Lady Warriors trudged their way through the winner’s bracket and had a state tournament berth within their grasp… only to fall to Seiling and Thomas on back-to-back nights.

Let’s fast forward to this season, now Mitchel’s second.

The team battles its share of injuries - as do a lot of squads - but still manages most of its schedule.

The Lady Warriors bull their way through the winner’s bracket and land back in the area championship game.

And lose.

And then, with one more shot, Okarche got off to a disastrous start against Ripley in the consolation championship game.

But if you were there - or if you watched online - you saw no panic from the sideline.

You saw fire - reminiscent of her mother - but you never saw fear.

That carried over to the team. Mitchel will tell you the team just started playing better - and it did.

However, had the Lady Warriors sensed panic in their coach, who’s to say they would have come through that night?

The scenario somewhat repeated itself a couple days later in the state quarterfinals.

Okarche trailed a very, very good Garber team by six points with 6:10 to play and was struggling mightily from the perimeter.

A few stern, but calm, adjustments saw Okarche go on a 19-4 run to end the game and land in the state semifinals.

Those semis weren’t kind to Okarche on the scoreboard, but Hydro-Eakly was truly a great team that got upended in the state title game to deny it a three-peat.

But the Lady Warriors’ run to the semifinals was another foundation builder for the program under Mitchel.

The team plays like the Lady Warrior squads that Mitchel played on in the early- to mid-2000s and the ones she was an assistant coach for when the program became a regular in the state championship game.

In a nutshell, they play relentlessly hard on both ends of the floor for 32 minutes. Most teams can’t maintain that.

Mitchel demands it. That, plus having the players who are willing to buy into something that’s going to require more daily effort from them, is what makes Okarche one of the best programs in the state.

Mitchel was a part of that success as a player, as an assistant and now as the program’s figurehead.

This is Kingfisher County, so tradition and girls basketball aren’t limited to one school.

Which leads me to Lomega.

Due to the heights reached by the program - higher than any other girls program in the state - anything less than a state championship is most years considered a failure.

The Lady Raiders didn’t win state this year. That said, you won’t see

That said, you won’t see anything on these pages about the season being a failure. Yes, the Lady Raid

Yes, the Lady Raiders lost more games than they’re accustomed. Six.

A six-loss season is considered good to great by most programs. You don’t see it very often in Lomega.

But let’s examine the six:

Okarche – Class A semifinalist

Tuttle – Class 4A runner-up

Okeene – Class B quarterfinalist

Luther – Class 3A quarterfinalist

Seiling – Class A state champ

Pittsburg – Class B state champ

That’s a heavyweight lineup of games.

The loss to Okeene - a very sound, very wellcoached team - was avenged in the opening round of state.

We can rehash the state title game for days. We can break down this part of the game and that part of the game.

And there will be some good points made.

But sometimes, to me, it truly does come down to making shots. Some nights one team shoots better than the other.

Sure, teams can make it harder to get those shots. But good teams find a way to get open looks. They either go in or they don’t.

For Pittsburg, they went in on state championship Saturday at The Big House. For Lomega, they mostly didn’t.

Pittsburg was 19 of 38 overall (50 percent) and 12 of 22 (54.5 percent) from 3-point range. Lomega shot 15 of 33 overall (45.5 percent) and 3 of 15 (20 percent) from long range.

36-9. That was the difference beyond the arc in a two-point game.

Play it again and the fortunes very well could have been reversed. We’ve seen Lomega go off from long range. We’ve seen the Lady Raiders do it at state. We’ve seen them do it in the state title game.

It just didn’t happen this time. Still, Lomega had a shot

Still, Lomega had a shot to tie it at the end. That’s how close the Lady Raiders came to winning their third straight title.

Regardless of the outcome, this was a fun team to watch.

I pointed this out on a preview show I recorded - and possibly on these pages before - but I don’t know of any team EVER that returned two state tournament MVPs (Hensley Eaton and Darcy Roberts).

Those two were part of a tremendous scoring attack that also included Sydni Walker and Abby Swart. Few teams can boast that.

Few teams can boast that. Very few in Class B.

Pittsburg was just able to match it on the day they played.

The good news for Lomega is most of the scoring punch returns. And we also saw some youngsters emerge as the season wore on.

In other words, Lomega’s not going anywhere.

Kevin Lewallen - who will one day likely own more state titles than any other girls coach in Oklahoma history - has the machine rolling.

The Lady Raiders will get their shot again. This time, it might very well go in.

When the Class 2A boys state championship was over and the teams had retreated to their respective fan bases, I put out a simple Tweet:

“I wish they were all like John Hardaway.”

I’ve expressed my fondness for how the Cashion boys basketball coach handles his business before, but sometimes it bears repeating.

Here’s what prompted that Tweet:

Cashion had just lost the state title game, the biggest game in the program’s history and in Hardaway’s coaching career.

He had received his coach’s achievement plaque and his team the silver ball. The Wildcats then watched Dale receive its gold ball and individual gold medals. The team then posed for some quick photos with its runner-up trophy.

Hardaway’s head has to be spinning. He’s got to go address a team that includes eight seniors whose only goal was to win state.

But before he walks off the court, Hardaway turns around to personally thank Mark Radford of the Logan County Courier; Brad Stone, who chronicled the Cashion season with his camera; and yours truly.

Hardaway even threw in an extra congratulations to me for the OSSAA award I’d been presented the night before.

Look, there are gracious coaches everywhere, but for Hardaway to take the time in that moment lends further proof that he just gets it.

None of us was expecting him to make that u-turn and come talk to us and we certainly wouldn’t blame him for not. But he did.

On the court, there’s no shame in what Cashion accomplished.

The team went to heights unseen in the program’s history.

This senior class is responsible for breaking a two-decade-hex on getting past the regional tournament.

It qualified for three consecutive state tournaments for a program that had only been there twice before.

It won two games at state for the first time ever.

The Wildcats just came up short in the title game when Dayton Forsythe put on one of the best performances you’ll see on that stage. Not many teams could have overcome what Forsythe did that night.

Of course, that does little to console a Cashion team that had the gold ball-or-bust mentality.

There’s nothing wrong with that. Like Hardaway told them in the locker room after the fact, there will come a time when they can appreciate what they did.

It wasn’t going to be the next day. It wasn’t going to be the next week. It probably won’t be next month.

But there will come a time.

I don’t know what the future holds for Cashion boys basketball.

I know there are a lot of Wildcats waiting in the wings - young guys who’ve been watching what the guys like Landon LaGasse, Austin Frazier, Vance Raney, Jonah Jenkins, Nick Nabavi, Trey Tichenor and others have accomplished over the years.

But they’ve certainly got a huge legacy to follow.

We’ll see how they do. One thing is for certain: They’ve got the right coach to show them the way.