Bulldogs anxious to work way back to state tournament

BY IVAN SANDERS STAR CORRESPONDENT

The Hampton Bulldogs were within one eyelash of making it to the state championship game last season on the hardwood and the memories from that game still lingers in the minds of the returning players from last year’s team.

With those thoughts in mind, the Bulldogs are ready to get back to work and give themselves a chance to return to Murfreesboro to take care of unfinished business.

“We played about eight last year and we graduated six and have two returners in Cadon Buckles and Hayden Campbell,” said head coach Ned Smith.” We had a good junior varsity team last year and the kids have worked hard and our goal is always the same we just want to take it one game at a time and try to win as many as we can.”

Smith said the formula is a simple one if his team can achieve the same results as they did last season as they will need to work hard to build the right team chemistry and do the little things that winning basketball games require. And anyone knows that a team that plays for Smith has to do one thing and that is to play hard each and every night.

The success of the junior varsity last season is ex - pected to play huge dividends for the varsity Bulldogs this season as Smith will be looking at a group of players who played a lot of basketball in 2021-22.

“Buckles, Campbell, and Michael Anspaugh have worked really hard and we are counting on help from our seniors Levi Lyons, Dalton Nave, and Ty McElyea,” said Smith. “Juniors Dylan Trivett, Chance Point, and senior Brody Hicks have just finished football and we are counting on their contribution as well. We should be able to play a lot of kids this year.”

Like many of the other coaches in the Watauga Valley Conference, Smith feels that the conference is probably one of the toughest in the state with Unaka, North Greene, and Cloudland plus an up and coming University High program.

“I think that our conference will be like it was last year where you need to win your home games and try to get one or two on the road,” said Smith.