FARMINGTON --- Marion second-year head coach Sammie Lewis had a simple goal for his team ahead of last week's Class 5A state basketball tournament here inside Cardinal Arena.
Go 1-0, three times.
The first time was a 71-49 victory on Tuesday afternoon over Van Buren.
The second outing was a tidy 67-50 decision over Greenbrier in the state quarterfinals.
But, perhaps the loudest ovation of the season came on Saturday afternoon in the Marion locker room when the team urged Lewis to write “1-0” on the whiteboard after his team's 41-35 victory over the outright 5A West champion Farmington on its home court, just the second loss of the season for the Cardinals.
The victory catapults Marion (29-4 overall) into the state final for the fourth time in school history, joining the 1993, 2019, and 2022 teams as the other outfits to play for a state championship.
Marion's 29 victories this season established a school record for a single year.
The Marion Patriots will play the Little Rock Parkview Patriots at 1:45 p.m. on Saturday, March 14, at Bank OZK Arena in Hot Springs in a game that will be broadcast by Arkansas PBS, while MPAN will provide a free audio-only broadcast.
“It was the first thing the guys said when we got into the locker room,” said Lewis, who has now appeared in a state final as a player, an assistant coach, and now as a head coach. “Once I went up there and put 1-0 on the board, our guys went absolutely crazy. Can't say enough about the effort, preparation, and buy-in from our kids. They treated this week like a business trip from the time we left until we got home. It meant a lot to them to make a run this week.”
Marion got past Greenbrier on Friday afternoon behind 21 points from senior Jalen Neal, 17 from classmate Chandler Randle, and 12 by junior Korbin Littlejohn.
Mason Stallings led Greenbrier with 15 points, while Gavin Wallace and Carter Lubkey scored 12 points apiece.
In the semifinal victory at Farmington, a game in which each team entered on 19-game winning streaks, Karlyal “Duck” Hyland paced the Patriots with 11 points, while Randle finished with nine, and Neal and Littlejohn recorded six points apiece.
Cannon Taylor led Farmington with 11 points, while Eli Schwartzman finished with 10, and Ethan Kennedy scored eight.
Against Greenbrier (21-11 final overall record), Marion bolted out to an 18-4 lead after a quarter, led 30-20 at halftime, and took a 48-40 advantage after three frames.
“Greenbrier played with more size than we usually see, which gave us some trouble at times,” said Lewis. “Our bigs, Jamari Bruin, Jackson Black, and Jalen Neal, had to guard some taller dudes on the perimeter. They hadn't done just a lot of that during the year, but they earned a bunch of trust doing that in that game.”
In the nip-and-tuck Final Four contest against Farmington (32-2 overall), Marion led 8-7 after eight minutes, 15-12 at halftime, and 24-21 after three frames.
“That's a great win for us on the road,” said Lewis. “Ironically, our group seems to play great on the road, in hostile environments. They had to play their best possible game to pull that one out. We challenged them, and they pulled it off. All the credit to them, and to our seniors, I'm so glad they get to finish their careers in Hot Springs.”
WHAT'S NEXT?
The Marion Patriots will play the Little Rock Parkview Patriots at 1:45 p.m. on Saturday, March 14, at Bank OZK Arena in Hot Springs in a game that will be broadcast by Arkansas PBS, while MPAN will provide a free audio-only broadcast.
To watch the free Arkansas PBS broadcast, follow this link https://www.arkansastv.gov/
live .
To listen to the free MPAN audio-only broadcast, please visit the MPAN YouTube channel.