During a lengthy basketball season it can be hard at times to find ways to motivate a team. Washington coach Steve Flowers will not have that problem on Monday.
With its 70-62 win over Coastal Conference rival West Carteret in the regular season finale the Pam Pack locked up the sixth-seed for this week’s Coastal Conference tournament.
With a wild card berth seemingly out of the picture, Washington (8-13, 3-11) heads into its first round matchup at South Central (13-8, 8-3) knowing its next loss could be its last one.
“We’re going to have to win it to get in,” Flowers said. “It’s win or go home.”
The Pam Pack head into the playoffs with some momentum as it put forth a strong showing in its regular season finale against the Patriots.
“I think that gives them some confidence,” Flowers said. “The first thing is you have to believe, and getting a win helps you believe.”
Against the Patriots, senior Tyvon Copeland exploded for a career-high 27 points and grabbed nine boards, while junior Stevie Green recorded a double-double, tallying 19 points and 13 rebounds.
That kind of production will need to be duplicated.
“We’re going to need Tyvon to keep playing like that. If he does that we got a chance against anybody,” Flowers said.
In order to upset the Falcons the Pam Pack will look to several players to rise to the occasion.
“We need D.J. (Bell) to step up, John Tate’s got to keep playing like he did (against West Carteret) and we James (Austin) and Tarahje (Burke) need to rebound for us.”
Green leads the Pack in scoring with 14.6 points per game and is trailed by Copeland (8.6) and Bell (8.1). Throughout the season Washington has shown it can excel in al different aspects of the game, but on Monday it will need to be consistently good in all phases.
“We do good at deferent things well every night. Some nights it’s offense and some nights it’s defense,” Flowers said. “But we have to play smart. If we play smart we’ll be ok.”