On February 8, the Heritage basketball teams traveled to rematch the dominant Bentonville Tigers after a 35 point loss during their first conference matchup.

With all odds against the War Eagles, the men’s team fought a hard won battle with a final score of 32-35. Junior Logan Clines led the team in scoring with 10 points including the go-ahead three pointer and game sealing layup.

After the game, the Bentonville Tigers commended Tom Olsen, head boys basketball coach, and the War Eagles on the win. Via tweet, Bentonville basketball said, “Congrats to [Coach Olsen] and his team on the win tonight over our team. Well coached, well prepared, and just outplayed us. Thanks to all who came out to support our teams! GO TIGERS!!!” Quickly shooting back a reply, “Bentonville Basketball is a class program in the hands of brilliant coaches. War Eagles were very fortunate tonight hitting some timely 3 point shots. Wish the Tigers the best the rest of the way,” said Olsen.

The Twitter exchange sure did create mutual respect among the teams. “It was not surprising,” said Olsen, “Rippee’s a class guy and it definitely shows we are in it for the right reasons.”

The Heritage basketball team’s current ranking is 13 out of 16 in the AAA 6A basketball conference.  Before the 2018 school year began all sports, excluding football, became 6A. “So it has to do with the classifications in Central Arkansas because they combined 5 and 4A into one conference and then that takes us and moves us down a conference because there’s one less conference,” said assistant basketball coach, Kyle Moix. 

The War Eagles have won 5 conference games, and with another conference win, they will have a spot in state. “Basically we’ll just watch film and know the tendencies of the first team we have and prepare for the matchups ahead of that,” said junior Jason Kimball.  “With Coach Olsen’s system we should be able to go pretty far. It all depends on how we play as a team and follow the system.”

Senior Night will be held tonight, February 19, 2019, as the War Eagles face off against the Fayetteville Bulldogs in the last home game of the season. With at least 6 suspended players as a result of the brawl between FHS and Springdale on Friday, February 15, senior guard, Ethan Carpenter, approaches the game with confidence. “With the circumstances, this still isn’t a game we can blow off. We will have to go into this game fully focused and if we do that we can pull off a win,” said Carpenter.