The Braves Basketball team capped off a successful season with the third-place trophy from the 4A tournament over the weekend, the first time the program has brought home hardware from the largest classification.
“I can’t speak highly enough of these kids,” stated Head Coach Matt Shumway. “They’ve done everything we’ve asked them to do. They are a great group of young men and they will be very successful in whatever they do. I’m glad they could go out with a trophy and go out playing a good clean game.”
The weekend started off against the Cheyenne Central Indians, a team that was ranked #2 for most of the season in the 4A East. Come tournament time, there is always a bit of assumption that the Eastern Conference is superior. Shumway noted that this was at least partially on the minds of the team.
“The [East/West] thing is something we were aware of,” he said. “We felt like this year, as much as any, that the West was as good or even better in terms of the depth this season. I think that’s the way it played out too. We tried to approach it as another opportunity and try to control what we could control.”
The Braves were in control for the vast majority of the game as senior Cooper Lancaster was virtually unstoppable on his way to 32 points and nine rebounds in a 70-61 final. He made ten total field goals and made 11 of 15 free throw attempts. Junior Roman Erickson was also hard to stop as he made seven baskets and finished with 16 points.
“You’re always concerned with those first games,” Shumway added. “Both teams have had a week to prepare. Central has a lot of good explosiveness and I was pleased with how we settled in. We let them get back in the game a couple times but we did enough to win. I thought the boys did really well with keeping their composure.”
In the semifinals the Braves moved over to the Ford Wyoming Center where they ran into eventual champion Sheridan who looked every bit the favored squad they were hyped to be in a 70-45 loss.
“We knew they were really good going in and sometimes you get on the court and they look even better than they did on film,” Shumway continued.” We never got going offensively and they made some really difficult shots. We played a little tight on the big stage but you can’t take anything away from Sheridan. They are the state champs and they were a machine on Friday. It’s disappointing because we wanted to have a better showing.”
Lancaster led the team with 14 points against the Broncs while Lincoln Liddiard and Tayt Lawson scored eight and seven points respectively. Erickson led the team with six rebounds.
The loss dropped the Braves into the third-place game where they faced off against Thunder Basin High School out of Gillette. Although no longer playing for the state championship, the Braves had a chance to do something the program had not been able to accomplish before, winning a trophy in the 4A class. Previous efforts to do so had ended in losses in 2024, 2022 and 2021.
The Braves put on a show as they left no doubt on Saturday, blowing out the Bolts 81-35 behind 16 made three-point baskets, the most made by any 4A team this season.
“I wasn’t expecting a result like that but we were happy to see it happen,” Shumway said. “I’ve always known we have that capability to explode. We’ve had moments like that and games where we’ve done it but we haven’t been consistent. It was a game where it all came together at the same time.”
Leading the hot shooting was Dylan Shumway who made five of six from behind the arc in the first quarter alone. With the game already getting out of hand on the scoreboard, Shumway took a hard charge from the Bolts’ Gibson Williams and was slow to get up. When he did, a broken nose and a pool of blood on the court was the result. After a halftime of treatment, Shumway did return and made two more long-range baskets and a layup as he finished the game with eight 3-pointers and 26 points.
“I was proud of him to take that shot to face and to be able to gain his composure and come back in and impact the game again,” Shumway commented.
Cooper Lancaster finished with 21 points and Erickson scored 12. Lincoln Liddiard and Will Linford combined for 17 rebounds in the winning effort. All seven seniors scored in the contest.
A Look Back at the 4A Transition
After playing the majority of the program’s history in the 3A classification or its equivalent over the history of Star Valley High School, the Braves have now played a total of 12 seasons in Wyoming’s 4A Class. In the last eight seasons, the program has qualified for the State tournament all eight times and hold an overall record of 127-79 (.620) in that time. The program also played four seasons in 4A from the 2007-08 season through the 2010-2011 season. The improvement began even back then when the team improved from two wins to 11 and then earned a trip to the 4A tournament and won a game in 2011. Looking at the trends of the school enrollment moving forward, a move back to the Wyoming 3A class is highly unlikely. But based on the evidence of the last eight seasons, the Braves are showing that this will not be the last time they find themselves bringing home a trophy from the final Saturday of the season.
