Asheboro’s Hakemme Butler goes up for a shot as Uwharrie Charter Academy’s Ethan Kinney, left, and Walker Wilkins look on. Both teams are in this week’s Davidson-Randolph Christmas Classic, though at different sites. (PJ Ward-Brown/Randolph Record)
CLIMAX – The Davidson-Randolph Christmas Classic is set for another go-around using two sites, but the field isn’t quite as big as last year.
This week’s girls’ and boys’ basketball tournaments will have one slight difference in terms of number of teams.
Providence Grove and Ledford are the sites. But the Providence Grove site has only seven girls’ and seven boys’ entrants, so that means fewer games there.
“It threw a wrinkle into it,” said Calvin Brown, outgoing athletics director at Providence Grove.
Games will be held Tuesday through Thursday.
There will be six games per day at Providence Grove and eight games per day at Ledford.
At Providence Grove, the girls’ pairings are Asheboro-South Davidson, Southwestern Randolph-Thomasville and North Davidson-Providence Grove with Randleman receiving a bye.
It’s the same matchups for the boys except Randleman will take on South Davidson, with Asheboro receiving the bye.
At Ledford, the pairings are: Wheatmore-Davie County, Trinity-West Davidson, Uwharrie Charter Academy-Lexington and East Davidson-Ledford.
Brown, who’ll officially begin duties as Asheboro’s football coach next month, said some rather late withdrawals created the bracket oddity. Adjustments were made to even the field between the two sites as much as possible.
“It all worked out and we’re going to have a good tournament,” Brown said.
He also said by nixing morning games at the Providence Grove site that reduced the impact in terms of attendance because those are generally the least attended games.
Games begin each day at 12:30 p.m. at Providence Grove and at 9:30 a.m. at Ledford.
Eastern Randolph, Central Davidson, Jordan-Matthews and Oak Grove aren’t participating this year. Central Davidson’s boys’ team won the Providence Grove site last year and Oak Grove’s girls were titlists at Ledford.
UCA, Davie County and North Davidson are newcomers, while South Davidson, Southwestern Randolph and Thomasville have switch sites. Southwestern Randolph and Thomasville met on the opening day last year at Ledford.
Randleman’s girls were champions at Providence Grove. Thomasville’s boys won at the Ledford site last year.
