PEORIA, Ill. (WMBD/WYZZ) — The solid season Richwoods is putting together can be traced to last season.
The Knights say as soon as they were eliminated from in the regional semifinal by Metamora, they almost immediately got back into the gym to turn their attention turned to this season.
“After we finished, we felt like we disappointed ourselves.,” said Richwoods coach Will Smith. “We lost to a really good Metamora team that got second at state. We felt like we had unfinished business. We got right back to work.”
And that work is paying off now. The Knights are 22-4, state ranked and a top-two seed in their sectional.
In class 3A basketball, there’s been a lot of talk this season about Metamora, Springfield Sacred heart-Griffin and Decatur MacArthur, whom Richwoods beat. The Knights feel like they might be under the radar.
And they are OK with that.
“We’ll take the underdog role,” said senior Marquell Newsome. We have to play everybody eventually. As long as we are the underdog, we have something to work for.”
Richwoods hosts Notre Dame in a big city rivalry game Tuesday.
“Eventually they have to wake up,” said Richwoods junior Jared Jackson of teams around the state. “We are going to show them the hard work we have been putting in, the type of team we have. We’ll let our game do the talking.”
And somewhere down the road, Richwoods could get another crack at Metamora. The team that ended the Knights season a year ago and made them hungry to get back to work for this season is in their sectional.
“I would love to see them in the sectional finals, Smith said. “I’m pretty sure that’s the match-up a lot of people want to see. I think it’d be a great game.”