ALBEMARLE — Winners of four games in a row and eight of its last nine, the North Stanly boys’ basketball team notched a big nonconference road victory Monday night, taking down the West Stanly Colts with a 65-50 win.
It was a matchup of teams in similar situations as the season moves into its stretch run. Both the Comets and Colts are in second place in their respective conferences behind a team that’s undefeated in conference play.
The Comets (15-6, 9-2 Yadkin Valley Conference) are below Robinson (18-3, 10-0 YVC), which handed North Stanly both of its YVC losses this season (Dec. 10 and Jan. 26). The Colts (11-8, 6-2 Rocky River Conference) have lost two in a row after winning off a five straight and are No. 2 in the RRC standings below Monroe (11-6, 9-0 RRC), who defeated the Colts on Feb. 4.
Both the Comets and Colts still have a chance to possibly tie for first place in their respective regular season standings.
North Stanly has two games left on its schedule, although only one is a conference matchup: a Wednesday night game at Community School of Davidson (10-8, 5-3 Catawba Shores) and a Friday night road game against Union Academy (5-17, 3-7 YVC). First-place Robinson has two conference games remaining on its schedule.
West Stanly was set to face first-place Monroe on Tuesday night in an important RRC contest that would give the Colts a chance to catch the Redhawks. West Stanly will travel to Anson (7-14, 2-7 RRC) on Friday, while Monroe hosts Piedmont (8-13, 2-7 Southern Carolina) on Wednesday and heads to Forest Hills (9-14, 5-4 RRC) on Friday.
Following Monday’s game, West Stanly coach John Thompson acknowledged on social media that his team’s Senior Night contest was memorable despite the loss.
“Not the result we wanted, losing to a talented North Stanly team, but we showed a lot of love for our seniors tonight,” Thompson wrote. “Jax (Hall), Charlie (Carpenter) and Jacob (Lisk) are three of the finest young men you could ever know.”
The three other Stanly County varsity boys’ hoops teams — Albemarle, South Stanly and Gray Stone Day — have not fared nearly as well this season.
The Bulldogs (9-9, 4-5 YVC) have had moments of success, while the Bulls (3-18, 2-8 YVC) are having one of their worst seasons in years. The winless Knights (0-16, 0-10 YVC) continue their program-long streak of not having a winning season.