Houston Yates draws national scrutiny after 170-35 demolition of Houston Lee in high school boys basketball.
Talk about wavering all week about whether to weigh in on this column space about the high school basketball story drawing all the national hub-bub, the 170-35 annihilation by Houston Yates over Houston Lee last week in district play. As a matter of fact, there was as much wavering about even addressing this in a column as there is wavering on exactly where I stand on this entire matter. 
Brandon Peters, Yates
File photo by Jim Redman
Yates, of course, is the Class 4A No. 1 team in the state according to the Texas Association of Basketball Coaches/Tex Preps Basketball magazine state rankings. The Lions are 15-0, and nine of those wins have reached triple figures in scoring. Yates has already participated in non-district tournaments in Hawaii and Alabama and could easily get bored as they go through their district before the playoffs start.
Lee, meanwhile, has fielded a struggling program for years at a school that does not field a football team. Yates has the stronger numbers, the deeper bench, the more talented athletes and the chase of a mythical national high school basketball championship.
So it came to be that the teams met up last week and by halftime the score was already 100-12. Despite a running clock in the second half, Yates still tacked on another 70 points. The final buzzer could not come soon enough, and now writers and fans are weighing in from coast to coast about whether this was a running-up-the-score disgrace or a coach who even while playing the last players off his bench wants to see them giving maximum effort during their minutes on the court.
My mind has waffled more than Waffle House has waffles, because in a way I see both sides of the argument. Back-ups want to become starters or at the least earn more significant playing minutes, and they are not going to impress the coach by entering with a 100-point lead and instructed to pull the ball out and run clock. On the other hand, at what point is the victory margin enough? What does a press accomplish in the face of a 100-point margin against an overmatched opponent?
Maybe the answer is a middle ground compromise of sorts in games where literally everyone knows the winner before the game is played. Why not for the starting five mix in starters with some bench players, and when that group comes out, some of the other starters come in with bench players. (Think the University of Texas might have been better served had Garrett Gilbert been in for a few first-half meaningful snaps with the first team rather than relegated to mop-up duty and mostly just handing the ball off?) The result might likely be the same, but by starting some second-team players (and maybe why not even an occasional third-team player) those athletes are getting an opportunity to run and work with some first-team members, which can only help the second-unit performers in the future.
Coaches obviously build their team to peak come playoff time and it is understandable to want to work the starting unit as much as possible. At the same time, it doesn’t hurt to train an eye to the future by working in the bench earlier than usual to ready some players who will be starters the next year.
So there, we’ve talked about it and … I still do not know with 100-percent conviction which side of the debate I fall. In UIL competition, though, the mantra of sportsmanship is and should be above all others. When everything is boiled down, the question will always be whether this game was a show of sportsmanship. The answer is not as black and white as it would often appear.
Poll position
As district play rolls around for all schools, last week did not offer many upsets in league play. But when it came to notching some impressive non-district wins, Class A Division I No. 1 Cayuga is at the top of the list. Cayuga, which won a state football championship behind Texas football commit Traylon Shead and Texas A&M football commit Malcome Kennedy, started 1-2 in basketball while playing schools in bigger classifications. Cayuga last week took on a pair of 3A heavies in Crockett and Van in non-district and knocked off both of their opponents. Consider Cayuga the most feared 3-2 team in the state.
Unblemished
In addition to Houston Yates, Fort Worth Arlington Heights remains one of two unbeaten Class 4A squads. The Yellowjackets keep rolling and are now 22-0 after topping Fort Worth Eastern Hills and Fort Worth Western Hills. East, West, North, South, Arlington Heights appears ready this year to beat teams from any direction.
In Class 2A, a pair of teams also reside at 22-0 in No. 5 Hallettsville and No. 7 Wall. The Brahmas from Hallettsville beat Schulenburg and Hempstead last week while Wall’s Hawks knocked off Hawley and Breckenridge to also remain unbeaten.
R.V. Baugus is publisher and editor of Tex Preps Basketball magazine and www.texprepsbasketball.com.
