By Brian Pitts
Davie Enterprise Record

The Davie boys basketball team’s 80-78 loss at Reagan in the first game of last week evoked memories of other painful defeats. Davie has five losses by a combined 10 points.
Not to worry. It all ended well.
North Davidson represented gravy to Davie’s hungry wolves, and the War Eagles destroyed visiting North 90-63 in the final regular-season game.
The win put Davie and Reagan in a tie for second behind Mt. Tabor. But Davie’s win over Tabor (the Spartans swept Reagan) gave Davie the No. 2 seed and a first-round bye in this week’s conference tournament at Reagan. The semifinals were Feb. 15 and the finals are Feb. 17.
The one thing that could throw a kink in the War Eagles’ plan: If Davie and Reagan met in the Feb. 15 semifinals, the winner will earn the Central Piedmont Conference’s No. 2 seed, and that means at least one home game in the state playoffs.
Davie improved to 17-6 and 6-4 in the CPC. That’s noteworthy for a couple reasons. It’s just the eighth time in 56 years that Davie has reached 17 Ws. Davie went 17-5 in 1962, 20-3 in 1969, 17-7 in 1970, 18-7 in 1988, 21-6 in 2000, 17-8 in 2005 and 19-6 in 2011.
The War Eagles tied for second for the second year in a row. That’s an accomplishment – especially when you consider Caleb Martin has been out since December – for a program that sputtered to 10-44 in the league from 2005-06 through 2009-10.
Much to home side’s delight, the War Eagles avenged a fluky 59-56 loss to North in Welcome, and they did it on Senior Night for Adam Smith, Kevin Miller, Davis Absher, Shannon Dillard and Nate Jones.
“The biggest thing was we forced a tempo and they played at a speed they weren’t comfortable with,” coach Mike Absher said. “We could never make them do that over there. In the second half we went back to our fullcourt zone press, which we hadn’t done much of lately, and it just made them not as effective offensively. The score didn’t need to be in the 50s like it was over there. We thought if we could get them down, then we could bury them.”
Earlier in the week at Reagan, it was a lost opportunity for Davie. After belting Reagan 73-55 in the first meeting, when Davie led 44-29 at the half and coasted to its first series win in seven tries, the War Eagles saw their three-game winning streak go up in smoke …