Sale Creek Teams Sweep Lookout Valley In 5-A

Madi Ellis, Brayden Mooneyham Leaders In Lopsided Wins

  • Tuesday, January 14, 2025
  • John Hunt

About the best thing that can be said concerning the District 5-A battle between Lookout Valley and Sale Creek Tuesday night is that both Sale Creek teams won with ease and both remained unbeaten in district play with three wins against no losses.

It was really a couple of mismatches as the Lady Panthers improved to 12-6 overall with a 63-21 victory while the Sale Creek guys are now 9-8 with their 70-25 win over the Yellow Jackets.

There’s never an easy way to write about two games like this.  The original goal of this writer some 46 years ago was to be able to write positive news about young people and that refers specifically to amateur sports.

Sale Creek coach Daniel Moore knew that his guys had a really big advantage over the Lookout Valley boys, so he chose to start five guys who never start and it was the Sale Creek subs who saw most of the action.  If you want to talk about a classy way to start a game, that was it in a nutshell.

And late in the game when the outcome had long been decided, Lookout Valley’s Noah McBryar missed two straight shots from long range, but the Sale Creek players who got the rebound quickly passed it back to the Yellow Jacket sub who finally swished a 3, much to the delight of both teams and the fans who were still present.

“This was a bench game for us as we rotated players every four minutes and our normal starters only had four minutes for the entire game,” Moore said following the game.

“We’ve been on the other side of games like this, but we just wanted to show respect to those other guys as they played hard and want to win just as much as anyone.  I thought the biggest thing for us was the character we showed.

“We’re just trying to teach these young guys how to be decent young men and how to show respect for others, regardless of the circumstance.  It was still a district win, which is big, but we knew we have to be ready every time we play as this is a tough district and winning isn’t always easy,” Moore added.

Lookout Valley head coach Michael Lane spent many years as a successful assistant coach at Signal Mountain, but he’s been faced with a huge challenge in this time at Lookout Valley as this school is most likely the smallest public school in Hamilton County and doesn’t have the numbers to choose from like most other schools.

Consider the fact that at least seven pretty good athletes transferred to other schools to play other sports and you see that Lane’s job is tougher than most.  Despite that fact, he’s going his absolute best to teach life lessons to his kids, knowing that those are much more important in the long run than the final score of a basketball game.

“We are starting over from scratch, but my guys played hard the entire game and that’s the number one goal for us right now,” the likable fellow said shortly after the final horn had sounded.

“Sale Creek is much older and more experienced than us, but we’re learning and we’re growing.  If we can just stick together during these tough times, we might be pretty good one day soon.

“It’s not easy, but we’re focused on individual goals with the top priority having fun along the way.  We’re trying to teach the team concept of basketball. I feel like we’re doing things the right way.  It just doesn’t always show up on the scoreboard,” Lane added.

Brandon Moore sank a 3 in the first minute of the game as the Yellow Jackets had a 3-0 lead at the start, but Sale Creek then scored 16 straight before Lookout Valley scored again.

The biggest question at that point wasn’t who was going to win, but just how large the margin of victory would be for the Panthers.

The difference was 23-8 when the first quarter ended and 43-12 at the half.

There wasn’t as much scoring in the second half with a continuously-running clock, but the best news is that lots of players got valuable playing experience and nobody got hurt.

Brayden Mooneyham was the scoring leader for Sale Creek with 20 points that included four shots from long distance.  Grayson Bailey added 10 for the winners while Ben Goulart finished with nine.

Moore was tops for Lookout Valley with 11 points while Brandon Appleberry finished with seven.

The Yellow Jackets are now 0-7 for the season.

SALE CREEK GIRLS 63, LOOKOUT VALLEY 21: It didn’t take long for the Lady Panthers to take charge as a 13-3 lead after one quarter stretched to 35-8 at intermission and only got bigger.

Madi Ellis scored 17 points to lead Sale Creek while Destany Cunningham and Chelsea Levi both finished with 10.

Harlow Jacobs was tops for Lookout Valley with seven points while Damyla Jones had six.

GIRLS SUMMARY

LOOKOUT VALLEY  3  5  11  2  --  21

SALE CREEK  13  22  19  9  --  63

LOOKOUT VALLEY (21) – Jones 6, Jacobs 7, Rollins 3, Tate 3, Sams, Cannon, Moore, Collins, Case, Alford, Wallin.

SALE CREEK (63) – Destany Cunningham 10, Williams 6, Madi Ellis 17, Hughes 5, Holland 5, Garner 3, Arnold 2, McCuiston, Smith 5, Waller, Chelsea Levi 10, McKee.

3-POINT GOALS: Lookout Valley 2 (Rollins, Tate); Sale Creek 6 (Cunningham 2, Ellis, Hughes, Holland, Smith).

BOYS SUMMARY

LOOKOUT VALLEY  8  4  6  7  --  25

SALE CREEK  23  20  12  15  --  70

LOOKOUT VALLEY (25) – Keef, Appleberry 7, Holland, Fitch, Brandon Moore 11, O’Connor, McBryar 3, Moore, Denton, Eller 2, White, Wiley, Wilcox, Askew, Johnson, Laymon 2.

SALE CREEK (70) – LaRosa 5, Khari Escobar 4, Freeman, Goulart 9, Robards 3, Tate, Hodges 2, Tullos 7,  Wilson 6, Brayden Mooneyham 20, Khalil Escobar, Bailey 2, Jares 2, Grayson Bailey 10.

3-POINT GOALS: Lookout Valley 3 (Appleberry, Moore, McBryar); Sale Creek 9 (Mooneyham 4, Tullos 2, LaRosa, Goulart, Robards).

(Email John Hunt at nomarathonmoose@gmail.com)

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