Bears and Bobcats begin boys basketball playoffs

The state playoffs for boys basketball began on Tuesday, February 21, with two Orange County teams competing. The Little Cypress Mauriceville Bears (24-11) and the Orangefield Bobcats (26-8) both finished in second place for their Class 4A and Class 3A districts respectfully.

The Bears opened their anticipated playoff run against the same team they faced last year in bi-district the Huffman Falcons. In 2022 Little Cypress Mauriceville defeated Huffman 59-43 during which Alantheon Winn scored 24 points to lead the Bears.

Orangefield played the Hemphill Hornets (17-13) at Warren. The Bobcats won their final two regular season games to go 9-3 in district and clinch second place ahead of the Anahuac Panthers. Hemphill was 8-6 in its district to finish in third place.

The Bridge City Cardinals (19-11) just missed making the playoffs despite winning on Senior Night 63-52 over the West Orange Stark Mustangs to close out their season. The Cardinals lost a close game to the Jasper Bulldogs 61-57 in their next to last game, and Jasper then defeated Vidor in the final game to clinch the fourth and final seed in District 19-4A.

Bridge City had two seniors who both scored in double figures in their final game. Fernando Rodriguez tallied 10 points for the Cardinals. Walker Britten had 15 points including a trio of three-pointers giving him 133 for the season a school record at Bridge City.