Bobcats' victory acts as catapult

SA Times - From sixth to third.

What a vault the Central High School boys basketball team made with a 53-51 victory over Odessa Permian on Tuesday night.

The win, sparked by an 18-point performance by Marc Campos and some late clutch free throws by Stevie Peasant, along with other developments around the district Tuesday night, suddenly has the Bobcats seeing new heights.

The Bobcats have a 10-16 overall record now, but it's their 3-5 district mark that has them tied for third place in District 3-5A with two weeks left in the regular season.

The top four teams make the playoffs.

"I'm so happy because last year we didn't get anywhere close to this," said Peasant, who finished with 11 points.

"It's kinda crazy," said Central head coach Tim Bozarth, whose team has suddenly gone from losing three straight to being right back in the playoff picture in one evening. "It feels good. I think the guys have worked really hard and deserve a little bit of success. Hopefully winning a close game, even though it wasn't pretty at all, will give us a little confidence."

The night started off very pretty for Central as the Bobcats built a 17-point first-half lead.

Maybe it was the pre-game talk.

"Today coach basically told us it was a must-win situation," Campos said.

"You always debate whether to do that or not because you might be putting too much pressure on them," Bozarth said. "But I told them that if we don't win tonight, starting tomorrow we'd just play the season out. Realistically, losing tonight would have put us out.

"We're right there (in the playoff hunt) now. We're going to battle, and we'll see what happens."

That early fire had Central up so far (30-13 at one point) that the lead might have been a problem in itself.

"We should have beat them by more than that. We were just so excited that we were up by that much that we started messing up," Peasant said.

"We got that lead, and maybe the kids got a little tentative," Bozarth said.

Permian (6-21, 3-6) fought back, led by Tyrone Moorer and his team-high 13 points.

With 1:11 left in the third quarter, Permian tied the game at 34-34 on a Dalen Brooks layup.

With a renewed sense of urgency, Central never allowed Permian to take a lead.

A free throw by Sam Njemanze and a layup by Campos, both in the closing seconds of the third quarter, put the Bobcats up to stay.

Peasant made five of eight free throws in the final two minutes of the game to preserve the win and put Central in good position heading into Friday's home game against Midland Lee.

Lubbock : Wylie : Abilene : Midland Lee : Midland