Running, shooting, dribbling, passing, and defense are all requirements to have in basketball, especially at the high school level. Every team in Colorado is taught these techniques of the game but what makes the difference in the sport is how the athletes are taught by their coaches and the effort the athletes put into the sport. With those two aspects that I mentioned above, we saw FMHS basketball apply those in a great way.
The team went on a run that the town of Fruita went wild for the team ended up having a perfect record in the regular season ending up not only being first in conference play in the league but also first in the whole state of Colorado for 6A/5A play which is something that I think all Fruita could say they were not expecting. Fruita knew that the team would be great but nobody thought it would extend to such a measure that the boy’s team would become the best in the state.
After an outstanding regular season led by head coach Michael Wells and the outstanding players on the team such as Max Orchard, Daniel Thomason, and Jhett Wells the boys were bound to make it to the playoffs where they would be the number one seed in the bracket. The team would start the bracket at home playing against Highlands Ranch the #32 seed in which the boys would beat 55 to 43 adding even more impressive status to the basketball team, the boys could not lose a game! Advancing to the next game in the state bracket the boys would be playing against #17 seed Broomfield a very well-known school for their outstanding athletics. But Fruita came out hot putting up 18 points in the first quarter to Broomfield 12 points heading into the second quarter Broomfield came out looking to get the game all tied up but it did not matter Fruita would out-score them in every single quarter of the game winning 61 to 44.
Fruita would come to their next game in the Great 8 where they would face an amazing team, Eaglecrest led by their point guard Ladavian King, an outstanding player who averaged around 18 points a game. With all the momentum in the world, Fruita would come out excited to play this game but it wouldn’t matter in the first half the boys would lose both quarters with the score being 33 to 18 at Fruita losing in the first half of a game for the first time in the playoffs. The boys still had some fight in them though putting up 20 points in the third quarter to Eaglescrest’s 17 points and in the 4th quarter Fruita put up 15 points to Eaglecrest’s 11 but ultimately it would not be enough the boys would lose in the great 8, 61 to 53.
Although the boys fell they still had one of the most impressive seasons that Fruita basketball has ever seen with a final record of 25 wins and 1 loss in total that being a 96% win rate. When asking senior Max Orchard what made the season so great he replied “The energy of our team this year was outstanding and the effort we put in at practice and the way we all had chemistry made our season go from just being great to outstanding.” Even though the boys didn’t get a state championship they still put up one hell of a fight.
