Basketball Game Preview: East Wilkes Cardinals vs. South Stokes Sauras

East Wilkes is 0-9 against South Stokes since December of 2014 but things could change on Friday. The East Wilkes Cardinals are taking a road trip to face off against the South Stokes Sauras at 8:00 p.m. Both teams are coming into the match red-hot, with East Wilkes sitting on five straight wins and South Stokes on ten.

East Wilkes will head into Tuesday's contest hoping to keep the good times rolling: they had to skate by with only a two-point margin when they last took the court, which might have inspired the 33-point drubbing they dealt Elkin on Tuesday. East Wilkes simply couldn't be stopped as they easily beat Elkin 73-40.

Meanwhile, South Stokes didn't have too much trouble with East Surry on Wednesday as they won 81-67. Given the Sauras' advantage in MaxPreps' North Carolina basketball rankings (they are ranked 85th, while the Cardinals are ranked 387th), the result wasn't entirely unexpected.

South Stokes' victory was their 21st straight at home dating back to last season, which pushed their record up to 16-2. Those victories came thanks to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they averaged 78.2 points per game. As for East Wilkes, they have been performing incredibly well recently as they've won eight of their last nine games, which provided a nice bump to their 12-6 record this season.

East Wilkes ended up a good deal behind South Stokes in their previous matchup on January 9th, losing 65-51. Can East Wilkes avenge their loss or is history doomed to repeat itself? We'll find out soon enough.