Mustangs Marvel Along
North Shore on the way to third State Championship Game
Dec 20, 2018, 9:21 pm
Mustangs Marvel Along
Originally Appeared on VYPE
HOUSTON – Add Lake Travis to the list.
That list being the perennial power programs in Texas high school football – Katy, Cy-Fair and now Lake Travis – that North Shore has dispatched each of the last three weeks to get to the final game of the year.
Zach Evans rushed for 196 yards and four touchdowns, and Dematrius Davis passed for 231 yards and two scores, as North Shore defeated Lake Travis 51-10 in the Class 6A Division I state semifinal inside NRG Stadium on Saturday.
"It has been phenomenal programs, well-coached programs, very talented programs that are working every bit as hard as we are," North Shore coach Jon Kay said. "We knew whoever was coming out of this Region III was going to be two things – a pretty good football team and pretty beat up."
"Then, you get out of the Region III gauntlet, and you line up against somebody like Lake Travis, and then obviously whoever wins [between Allen and Duncanville]. That'll be another barn-burner [next week]."
North Shore improves to 15-0, matching the best record ever held by a Mustangs' football team, which was set in 2003.
"We're a special team, but we still haven't unlocked our full ability yet," Evans said. "That shows you what our program can do to players."
The Mustangs advance to the program's third-ever state championship game, joining the 2003 and 2015 teams. North Shore won the state championship both games.
"That's quite an accomplishment," Kay said. "I'm really proud of the program. I'm proud of the community, and it's a community that deserves this. I'm happy for our community, and hopefully we represent it well."
The story continues here
Adding a player of Kevin Durant’s caliber was too valuable an opportunity for the Houston Rockets to pass up, even though it meant moving on from Jalen Green just four seasons after they drafted him second overall.
Durant was officially acquired from Phoenix on Sunday in a complicated seven-team transaction that sent Green and Dillon Brooks to the Suns and brought Clint Capela back to Houston from the Hawks.
General manager Rafael Stone is thrilled to add the future Hall of Famer, who will turn 37 in September, to a team which made a huge leap last season to earn the second seed in the Western Conference.
Asked Monday why he wanted to add Durant to the team, Stone smiled broadly before answering.
“He’s Kevin Durant,” Stone said. “He’s just — he’s really good. He’s super-efficient. He had a great year last year. He’s obviously not 30 anymore, but he hasn’t really fallen off and we just think he has a chance to really be impactful for us.”
But trading Green to get him was not an easy decision for Stone, Houston’s general manager since 2020.
“Jalen’s awesome, he did everything we asked,” Stone said. “He’s a wonderful combination of talent and work ethic along with being just a great human being. And any time that you have the privilege to work with someone who is talented and works really hard and is really nice, you should value it. And organizationally we’ve valued him tremendously, so yeah very hard.”
Green was criticized for his up-and-down play during the postseason when the Rockets were eliminated by the Warriors in seven games in the first round. But Green had improved in each of his four seasons in Houston, leading the team in scoring last season and playing all 82 games in both of the past two seasons.
Pressed for details about why Green's time was up in Houston, Stone wouldn't get into specifics.
“It’s the NBA and you can only do trades if a certain amount of money goes out and a certain amount comes in and there’s some positional overlap or at least overlap in terms of on ball presence,” he said. “And so that’s what the deal required.”
In Durant, the Rockets get a veteran of almost two decades who averaged 26.6 points and six rebounds a game last season and has a career average of 27.2 points and seven rebounds.
Houston loves the veteran experience and presence that Durant brings. Stone noted that the team had arranged for some of its players to work out with him in each of the past two offseasons.
“His work ethic is just awesome,” Stone said. “The speed at which he goes, not in a game … but the speed at which he practices and the intensity at which he practices is something that has made him great over the years and it started when he was very young. So of all the things that I hope rubs off, that’s the main one I think is that practice makes perfect. And I think one of the reasons he’s had such an excellent career is because of the intensity with which he works day in day out.”
Durant is a 15-time All-Star and four-time scoring champion, who was the Finals MVP twice. The former Texas Longhorn is one of eight players in NBA history to score at least 30,000 points and he won NBA titles in 2017 and 2018 with the Warriors.
Now he’ll join a team chasing its first NBA title since winning back-to-back championships in 1994-95.
“Everything has to play out, but we do — we like the fit,” Stone said. “We think it works well. We think he will add to us and we think we will help him.”