In 1969, the first man landed on the moon, The Beatles released their album Abbey Road, and Bill Daake led Priory to win their first basketball district championship. 55 years later and Priory had not won a basketball district championship since. Coming into the season, Coach Bobby McCormack sought to change that. The 2023-2024 basketball season had many ups and downs. After losing star player Max Lipe, the team felt off for the first few games. Our 2-3 zone defense wasn’t as effective, we had trouble beating full court presses, and we weren’t getting to the free throw line as often as we would have liked. Our record at the beginning of the year at one point was an abysmal 4-8 and it looked like it would be a disappointing season. However, having a relatively inexperienced and young team, with not one but two sophomores in the starting lineup, the team needed time and experience to play to our fullest potential. The starting lineup consisted of some of the best players Priory has seen in a while, led by Christian Gonzalez who finished his high school career with over 1,000 points and will continue to play basketball next year at the college level at Hannibal-LaGrange University. Myles Garcia-Eidsness was tasked with guarding the opposing team’s best player each game and would frequently hit a clutch three-pointer when we most needed it. Henry Hibey had a historic year and broke the Priory school record for the most three-pointers in a single season. Robbie Temprano likewise was a lightsout three-point shooter and Jack Parent could out-hustle and out-rebound the opponent every game. When we were firing on all cylinders, we were a really tough team to beat.
Coming into the District Tournament, we were peaking at the right time and breezed past Christian HS and a good Bowling Green team. Whtifield however would be a tough team to beat with us losing by an embarrassing 21 points when we faced each other at the beginning of the year. However, with one of their star players injured and us playing at the top of our game, Priory won its first Basketball District Championship in 55 years, beating Whitfield 56-49. Although we were satisfied with making Priory history, we had a shot to go even further in the playoffs. We were certainly the underdogs when we faced Palmyra who had a staggering record of 26-1. With practically the entire town of Palmyra attending the game, we were able to shut them down to one point in the 4th quarter to beat them 40-29 in one of our best wins of the year. After beating one of the best teams in Class Three, a State Championship didn’t seem like an impossible dream anymore.
Our next game against Montgomery County was one of the closest and most intense basketball games I’ve seen at any level. After Priory leading at half, Montgomery County gradually clawed their way back to send the game into overtime. Priory’s record was 0-4 in games that went to OT, beginning with our very first game of the season against Eric Schweain’s Marquette beating us in OT. With our best player Christian fouled out and their 6-foot-9 center being practically unstoppable, we lost in overtime 40-42 in a heartbreaker. I truly believe that although Montgomery County played very well, we were the better team. Had the refs not missed some obvious calls or if their guards missed a difficult fade away jumper, we could have won. It would have been amazing to go to the semi-finals or even the finals, hosted at Mizzou’s basketball stadium.
Thank you to everyone who popped out to the games this year, especially on our season opener, Senior Night, our District Champion Win, or our final game of the season. The game against Montgomery County was the largest Priory sporting event I’ve seen in my six years at Priory: almost the whole gym was full of Montgomery County fans but you guys, the proud, the few, the Priory fans, were louder and more obnoxious than they so thanks for your support.
Despite the loss and the end of the year, Priory basketball has a bright future. Our starting lineup consisted of two Sophomores and likewise our JV team had a lot of young talent. JV Coach Dave Johnson described the JV team as, “The best JV starting lineup I ever had.” I hope to see Priory win their next District Championship in the near future and I don’t think it will take another 55 years.
