Basketball Recap: Lekendric Phillips Leads a Balanced Attack to Beat Humboldt

There's no place like home for Haywood, who bounced back after a loss on the road last Thursday. They rang in the new year with a 77-69 win over the Humboldt Vikings on Saturday. This was a revenge game for the Tomcats: when they faced off against the Vikings back in November of 2024, they had to take a 57-56 defeat.

Haywood got their victory on the backs of several key players, but it was Lekendric Phillips out in front who went 8 of 18 en route to 22 points and three steals. The game was Phillips' fifth in a row with at least ten points. The team also got some help courtesy of Antrell Jones, who went 6 of 9 on his way to 17 points and three steals.

Haywood is on a roll lately: they've won five of their last six matches, which provided a massive bump to their 9-9 record this season. Those victories came thanks to their offensive performance across that stretch, as they averaged 74.2 points per game. As for Humboldt, this is the second loss in a row for them and nudges their season record down to 9-5.

Haywood will look to defend their home court on January 11th against Covington at 7:30 p.m. As for Humboldt, they will head out to square off against Dyersburg at 6:00 p.m. on Tuesday.