CHARLESTON, W.Va — With Capital’s emergence this year following an 8-3 initial start with wins over rivals George Washington and South Charleston, Region 3 in Class AAA should bring must-see match-ups down the stretch.
“I think it’s one of the better regions in the state, we have always had a tough area to play against – the opponents are always tough,” Capital head coach Carl Clark said. “If you’re not prepared to play, anyone can beat you on any given night.”
The Cougars jumped out to a quick 5-0 start, but have cooled off of late as they have lost three of their last six games. Like many teams in the state, Mother Nature has taken its toll on Capital’s schedule – add in the water crisis from earlier this year, and it’s been difficult for the Cougars to stay in a rhythm.
”I don’t think right now we’re where we want to be, we’re not very sharp and our conditioning is bad,” he said. “We can’t put a lot of things in, because we haven’t been in the gym, so we have to really bone up on the things that we are doing (well).”
With the all of the scheduling changes and postponements, the Cougars will be taking advantage of any opportunity to play as the regular season winds down.
“We end up right now having to play Friday, Saturday, Monday and Tuesday,” Clark said. “And we may have to do that twice to get all of our games in.”
Since South Charleston was knocked off by the Cougars, the Black Eagles have won nine straight games and jumped up to No. 2 in this week’s MetroNews Power Index.
Last year’s Class AAA state runner-up Woodrow Wilson, another team from Region 3, comes in at No. 6 with a 10-2 record after reeling off five straight games this past week. Greenbrier East (12-3) will also be a tough out for any team out of Region 3 as well.
Capital has games on the horizon against George Washington and Woodrow Wilson – those games loom large as the Cougars try to position themselves for a late season push at postseason play.
“We’re going to have to get in the gym and get the kids motivated to realize that they need to work hard to get their conditioning back and to learn to execute the things that we want to do,” Clark said.
| CAPITAL Boys Basketball Schedule |
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| 1 | 12/13/13 07:30PM | A | GEORGE WASHINGTON | 83 | – | 73 | W | |
| 2 | 12/20/13 07:30PM | A | HURRICANE | 72 | – | 69 | W | |
| 3 | 01/04/14 07:30PM | H | ST. ALBANS | 86 | – | 48 | W | |
| 4 | 01/09/14 07:30PM | H | SOUTH CHARLESTON | 72 | – | 71 | W | |
| 5 | 01/15/14 07:30PM | H | NITRO | 80 | – | 51 | W | |
| 6 | 01/17/14 07:30PM | A | HUNTINGTON | 69 | – | 68 |
L | |
| 7 | canceled | A | CABELL MIDLAND | – | ||||
| 8 | 01/23/14 07:30PM | H | RIVERSIDE | 63 | – | 60 | W | |
| 9 | canceled | A | LOGAN HIGH SCHOOL TOURNAMENT | – | ||||
| 10 | 01/31/14 07:30PM | A | BIG ATLANTIC TOURNAMENT — LEWIS COUNY | 72 | – | 63 |
L | |
| 11 | 02/01/14 07:30PM | A | BIG ATLANTIC CLASSIC — PRESTON | 76 | – | 57 | W | |
| 12 | 02/03/14 07:30PM | A | WINFIELD | 90 | – | 77 | L | |
| 13 | 02/04/14 07:30PM | A | RIPLEY | 77 | – | 58 | W | |
| 14 | 02/08/14 07:30PM | H | PARKERSBURG | – | ||||
| 15 | 02/10/14 07:30PM | A | SPRING VALLEY | – | ||||
| 16 | 02/12/14 07:30PM | H | GEORGE WASHINGTON | – | ||||
| 17 | 02/14/14 07:30PM | A | PRINCETON | – | ||||
| 18 | 02/17/14 07:30PM | A | WOODROW WILSON | – | ||||
| 19 | 02/21/14 07:30PM | A | MSAC TOURNAMENT | – | ||||
| 20 | 02/27/14 07:30PM | H | LOGAN | – | ||||
| wins: 8 lost: 3 ties: 0 | ||||||||