H.S. BASKETBALL NOTEBOOK: Which Burke County teams can contend for conference titles?

The midpoint of the 2025-26 prep basketball season in Burke County is upon us, so now is a good time to examine each local teams’ resumes to date and gauge what their outlook is based on what they’re set to face throughout the remainder of conference play.

Entering this past week, four county hoops teams — the Freedom and Patton boys and the East Burke and Draughn girls — each sported records of eight or more wins and four or fewer losses.

Each of those programs has either won a conference title or reached at least the fourth round of the playoffs over the last three seasons, with the Lady Cavaliers actually having accomplished both of those feats on multiple occasions in that timeframe.

Forget 20-win seasons or regular-season success … that’s the bar for greatness in hoops across the county.

So, who are this season’s top contenders locally? Here’s a school-by-school look at what to expect over the last half of the season on the hardwood.

Draughn

At 9-2 overall, the Lady Wildcats had the county’s best record entering the week, and they had also started 2-0 in the Western Piedmont 3A/4A Conference.

Draughn — who recently collected a solid third-place finish in the West Lincoln holiday tournament — faced a pivotal set of three home games this past week, however, with the top two rated teams in its league (aside from Draughn) and a county rival on the schedule.

The Lady Wildcats started the stretch Tuesday with East Rutherford, who was No. 16 in the NCHSAA’s latest 3A RPI ratings, followed one day later by their attempt to sweep the season series with Freedom for the first time ever.

Draughn ended the week late Friday against a Hibriten squad who features two ex-Draughn players (Zoe Rector, Emilee Cook) and who’s No. 6 in the 4A RPI ratings, No. 8 in HighSchoolOT.com’s latest 828 area code rankings (regardless of classification), and who like Draughn entered the week with a 2-0 WPC mark.

Draughn’s two games with arch-rival East Burke should also prove to be wars. The Lady Wildcats look to break through following six consecutive losses (all by 13 points or more) to EB spanning the last three seasons.

The Lady Wildcats aren’t incredibly deep, generally using a seven-player rotation, but they feature three of the county’s top seven scorers in seniors Jacey Davis (11.5 points per game), Taylor Holder (9.8 ppg), and Kenley Berry (8.8 ppg) and are also getting solid production from junior starter Mati Kincaid (8.3 ppg) and sophomore reserve Bailey Winkler (5.9 ppg).

Draughn is No. 10 in the latest 3A RPI rankings.

On the boys side, Draughn (No. 55 in 3A RPI) recently gained its first win in the seventh-place game at West Lincoln and still has some work to do if it wants a postseason berth, as only the top 48 teams get in.

The play of county leading scorer Cayden Lewis (19.1 ppg) has been the highlight for the Wildcats, while fellow sophomores Henry Cooper (8.1 ppg) and Titus Dodd (7.6 ppg) are the team’s second- and third-leading scorers.

East Burke

The Lady Cavaliers feature five new starters but were the only county squad to claim a Christmas tournament title as they won three times at Freedom to climb to 8-4 overall, led by event MVP Belle Gwyn.

Gwyn is a 5-foot-10 senior who has collegiate offers after transferring in from her old school in Tennessee, and she is the county’s leading scorer at 14.3 ppg.

And while her standout play has been somewhat expected, freshman Sarabeth Bradley has been an eye-opener as last year’s East Burke Middle student-athlete of the year ranks second in the county at 12.8 ppg and has been a rebounding force who’s also a capable ball handler, driver, defender, and shooter.

Those two have been complemented by junior wing sharpshooter Addie Brittain (8.4 ppg) and freshman point guard and skilled distributor Frankie Gwyn (6.3 ppg).

The Lady Cavs (No. 24 in 4A RPI) played Hibriten tough in Lenoir already in defeat, and their other three losses have come against quality competition as well (at Freedom, twice against Alexander Central).

If EB continues to improve as the season progresses, and it figures to do so, this program may be a tough out as usual in the playoffs.

The East Burke boys, meanwhile, were dealt a tough blow early in the season’s fourth game as last year’s all-county and all-conference guard Owen Hartmann suffered a season-ending foot injury to cut short what might have been a standout senior campaign.

Still, EB has already won a conference game, and in a WPC boys race that features only four playoff teams at the moment (and just two who are firmly inside the bubble), this squad could manage another handful of league wins.

Junior Tyler Brown (11.4 ppg) has stepped into the role of primary offensive option for EB, while junior guard Carter Bennett is averaging 8.6 ppg and senior forward Luke Demiter is chipping in with 7.0 ppg.

Freedom

The Patriot boys hung with Asheville Christian (No. 2 in 828 rankings) but came up just short of their first title at their host Christmas tourney since 2019.

Freedom’s other two losses entering the week had come against tough teams as well in East Lincoln (No. 2 in 5A RPI, No. 13 in 704 area code rankings) and T.C. Roberson (No. 15 in 6A RPI, No. 9 in 828), the latter of which they have since avenged.

The Patriots are the only county team currently ranked in the top 15 of the 828, coming in at No. 5 this week. But they also play in arguably the toughest conference of any county team, as the Northwestern 6A/7A boys race is the only one locally to feature three area-code ranked squads (Watauga is No. 3 and South Caldwell No. 8 in 6A) and have all of its teams both above .500 overall currently and squarely inside the postseason bubble as Alexander Central at No. 29 in 6A RPI is league’s the lowest-ranked team.

And Freedom didn’t cut corners in nonconference scheduling either, with an upcoming rescheduled contest against Hickory (on Jan. 21), a team ranked No. 1 in this week’s 828 rankings.

Perhaps that will better prepare this year’s Patriots for the postseason. Freedom has won 18 or more games in three of the last four seasons but has yet to advance past the second round since its fourth and most recent state title season in 2019-20.

A deep and rangy Freedom squad is co-led by the backcourt duo of senior Kobe Johnson (18.1 ppg) and junior King Johnson (15.9 ppg), while third option Jaden Watkins (10.6 ppg) is an R-S Central transfer who joined the Johnsons on the All-FHS Christmas Invitational team.

The Lady Patriots have never suffered through a losing season under 22nd-year head coach and 441-game winner Amber Reddick, who has won state titles at FHS as a player (1995), assistant coach (2002), and head coach (2016).

But they stood at just 5-7 overall entering the week and face a tough road again in NWC play, headlined by 11-1 Alexander Central (No. 1 in 6A RPI, No. 6 in 828) and 10-4 McDowell (No. 14 in 7A RPI, No. 5 in 828), who last season reached the NCHSAA 4A West Regional final.

Two of the Lady Pats’ next three opponents, South Caldwell (No. 20) and Watauga (No. 29), also are ranked higher in the latest 6A RPI rankings than Freedom (No. 33).

The Lady Patriots play hard and defend well as usual. Their weaknesses are size and scoring, as despite having five different players who have each already scored 14 or more points in a game, the team has only eclipsed 60 points in one game to date while being held under 40 points on five occasions.

Freedom has been led to date by seniors Cynica Caldwell (11.5 ppg), Kaitlyn Hagmann (10.7 ppg), and Alayhia Bates (8.7 ppg), while Ava Cooke has added 6.0 ppg. All-FHS tourney performers and juniors Aniah Queen, a guard, and Simone Wright, a forward, have shown flashes of brilliance lately, and Freedom could use consistent production from both places.

Freedom may have to start away from home in its bid for a 20th consecutive season with at least one playoff win.

Patton

The Panther boys entered this week’s two home games (R-S Central on Tuesday, West Caldwell on Friday) with a chance to tie last season’s win total under second-year coach and PHS alum Dax Bostian.

Like the Draughn girls, they also sat at 2-0 in WPC action, tied with East Rutherford for the top spot in the league ahead of those teams’ Jan. 13 showdown in Forest City.

Outside of East Rutherford (No. 14 in 3A RPI, No. 15 in 828) and Patton (No. 32 in 3A RPI), no league team entered last week with more than four overall wins or with an RPI better than No. 41 in its classification.

One year after ranking seventh or better among county players in points, rebounds, assists, and steals, 6-3 senior all-county and all-conference returner Nathan Waters has recorded a pair of triple-doubles spanning those four statistical categories, and he enjoyed a separate streak earlier this season in which he had three consecutive double-doubles with at least 20 points.

Waters’ 14.8-point average leads the balanced Panthers, who have also gotten major offensive contributions from junior Olando Norman (14.2 ppg), sophomore Kyle Taylor (13.8 ppg), and senior Brady Davis (11.0 ppg) as the county’s only team with four players averaging double figures. Junior Karson Kress (7.8 ppg) brings size and toughness in the paint, while senior Laine Barrier is also a good athlete and willing passer who completes the team’s superb six-man starting rotation.

The Patton girls (No. 42 in 3A RPI) entered the week having dropped six straight games since a three-game win streak got them back to .500 early at 3-3. The program is still struggling to score points, with junior guard Mia Chapman averaging over 12 points through five games — when she was on pace to be PHS’ highest scorer in the last five seasons — but slipping outside the top 10 in the county recently at just 7.1 ppg to date.

Sophomore Leah Clark (5.5 ppg), junior Emma Rolland (4.9 ppg), and senior Melina Bernabe (4.7 ppg) are the team’s second- through fourth-leading scorers.

NCSSM-Morganton

While several Dragons’ fall athletic programs enjoyed banner seasons in the first-year Catawba River 1A/2A/3A Conference, both of the school’s basketball programs appear to still be several years away from glory at this stage.

They both entered last week idle since Dec. 8 and with 2-5 overall records (1-2 in the CRC).

The NCSSM-Morganton boys (No. 40 in 1A RPI) have several potent scorers, led by seniors Bransen Pittman (17.3 ppg) and Nate Gutschall (11.0 ppg) in double figures and accompanied by senior Nash Taylor (8.6 ppg) and junior Colin Henry (6.9 ppg), while no players for the Lady Dragons (No. 32 in 1A RPI) except for junior Amalia Bordoloi (8.3 ppg) is averaging over 5 points per game.

The nine-team CRC races both feature a county-best three squads who are ranked inside the top 10 of the latest RPI ratings in their classifications.

For the boys, Queen’s Grant is No. 1 in 2A (and No. 4 in the 704 rankings), followed by Piedmont Community Charter (No. 9 in 3A) and Jackson Day (No. 10 in 1A). On the girls side, Thomas Jefferson is No. 2 in 1A (and No. 15 in the 828 rankings), followed by Queen’s Grant (No. 6 in 2A) and Jackson Day (No. 6 in 1A).