No Liberty for West Oso in semifinal defeat

CORPUS CHRISTI West Oso's boys basketball team didn't have to travel a long way for the IV-3A regional tournament.

But once they got to the American Bank Center, long-distance daggers were what deep-sixed the Bears' state championship defense.

Liberty Hill's lights-out shooting was too much for West Oso, with the Panthers rolling to a 68-51 victory in their regional semifinal.

Liberty Hill (32-3) will face Miller (30-8) in today's 1 p.m. regional final, while West Oso's (30-6) 3A championship reign ends.

In the stinging aftermath, it was the latter that Bears coach Arnold Flores focused on.

"One of my closing speeches was it's not about what we didn't do tonight, but what we did throughout the course of the year," Flores said. "A lot of people picked us to come in second place and we won (District 31-3A) and some people didn't think we'd make it to the regional tournament and we did.

"I'm real proud of these young men for everything they've accomplished this year. We're going to be in the same situation next year. We've got one starter (Davon Fox) coming back and there are two sophomores that saw quite a bit of playing time. Now, the legacy's on their shoulders. With hard work, hopefully we'll be back again next year."

Given how the Panthers shot Liberty Hill made 11 3-pointers it seemed West Oso was powerless at times to stop their foes.

The Bears led 19-18 after the first quarter, but the hammer fell during the second, when Liberty Hill broke a 23-all deadlock with an 18-4 run to finish the half.

"Once we had the momentum and started making our shots, we knew we could go on from there and keep making shots and pressing hard," said Liberty Hill's Stephen Graves, who led his team with five 3-pointers among his 19 points.

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No Liberty for West Oso in semifinal defeat