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Dragon start with victory

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With Purcell’s 72-68 victory over Pauls Valley last Friday Roger Raper moved past Gary Looper into fourth place in the all-time wins at PHS.

Raper was 53-27 at Purcell heading into the 2020-21 season. In 13 years as a head coach Raper is 197-179 overall.

Raper welcomes three returning starters in Mojo Browning, who is the returning conference MVP, Nate Willis and Jorge Sotelo.

Browning averaged 14.7 points per game last year, Willis 103 and Sotelo 6.6.

Sprinkle in senior Misael Duque, senior Gammy Solis, sophomore Lincoln Eubank and freshman Noah Mason and Raper thinks the outlook is bright.

“All of those young men had tremendous off seasons and have shown great improvement both with their skill levels and strength gained in the weight room,” Raper said.

Raper said part of the 2020-21 season will resemble last year’s squad.

Gone to graduation off last year’s 21-6 squad are Gavin Nation and Grant Smith.

“Our strength will be our guard play like last year, although, our inside game should be stronger as all three of our bigs have added not only skill but needed strength and bulk,” the coach said.

“I believe we have the ability to be a very good perimeter shooting team with several players having the ability on a given night to really fill up the basket.”

Raper believes this year’s club has the capability to compete for another conference championship.

“Although our league has really improved with most teams returning some great experience and talented players,” Raper said. “It should be a very exciting season. I just hope these young men get to complete their season.”

The Dragons put their best foot forward in the season opener at Pauls Valley posting a four point victory over the Panthers.

The Dragons had a trio of players in double figures led by Nate Willis’ 27 points. Mojo Browning was right on his heels with 22 and Jorge Sotelo added a baker’s dozen.

As David Sikes enters his third season at the helm of the Dragons he welcomes back three starters off last year’s 15-10 campaign.

Sikes overall coaching record is 112-161.

Gone from last year’s team are Alicia Baker, Chelsea Spain, Anoli Billy and Sandra Del Toro.

Seniors Kora Keith and Emily Madden will provide key leadership roles for the Dragons who will be help from top prospects Jaiden Avila, Leslie Thompson and KK Eck.

“Those three played a lot of minutes last season and we will look to see them contribute early and often this season,” Sikes said.

Sikes reports the strength of this year’s squad will be shooting and ball movement. I also feel like we have good team chemistry,” he said.

“We need to be much better on the defensive side of the ball and we have to get some experience for our young bench.

“We have had a good pre season considering the overall conditions of 2020 but we continue to have a positive outlook and are grateful now more so than ever to get to play basketball.”

Overall outlook: “This season has no outlook for me. I want to play and in this season of life that is the most important thing. We are grateful to be out there on the court competing every day and/or night that we can.

“This team is a fun team to coach and is full of great young ladies, We obviously want to win every game however, we never know what challenges we might have to overcome on any given night,” he concluded.

The Dragons dropped their season opener at Pauls Valley last week, 56-51 despite eight different Dragons scoring and Emily Madden pouring in 15.

Purcell is scheduled to play in the CCS Tournament starting today (Thursday) and close out the pre-holiday portion of the schedule December 15 hosting Lindsay.

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