Warhorses make it eight straight
Owen extends winning with home victory over Brevard
Fred McCormick
The Valley Echo
January 9, 2025
A winning recipe cooked up another Owen victory, Jan. 8, as the Warhorses picked up their eighth in a row, besting Brevard, 69-63.
The Warhorses, led by 20 points and 10 rebounds from senior guard Asante Martin, extended a streak that began, Dec. 5, against the Blue Devils.
Twenty-four hours after a 66-21 victory on the road against Rosman, Owen established its first lead of the night early in the second quarter when a Brevard turnover led to a layup by senior Jack Wesley Burk, who finished the contest with 15 points. A late 3-pointer by senior Colton Morris gave the Warhorses a 27-18 advantage at the half.
Owen, with 15 points from senior Jared Kelley and 11 from fellow senior Eli Lewkowicz, never trailed in the second half, as a stingy perimeter defense and fast-paced transition game established a 15-point lead. Led by 3 from Martin and Burk, the Warhorses connected on 8 of 23 from behind the arc.
Owen remained undefeated on its home court this season with the win.
“We came out and wanted to be aggressive,” Martin said. “We really want to keep this winning streak, and especially our home winning streak, going. We want to give people a reason to come out here and have fun, so we’re trying to do something special for us, and for the people who support us.”
It starts, according to the team’s leading scorer, with a selfless style of play.
“We spent all summer practicing together, and we’ve all been putting in work together,” Martin said. “We’re really more like a family than a basketball team, on and off the court. We all just want to see each other succeed out there.”
With eight seniors on the roster, the bonds strengthened by years of playing together are the foundation of the team, according to Burk.
“A lot of us have grown up playing together, and we hang out before and during the season. We go get breakfast before games and we work hard, together,” said Burk, who has posted double-digit scoring efforts in 25 straight games. “I think when you’re working really hard with a bunch of guys you’ve known all your life, it makes it really easy to trust each other to do what needs to be done.”
Their goal, according to the players, is to win the Western Highlands Conference, where Owen’s 3-0 mark puts them in the top spot.
“We’re trying to do some things that haven’t been done around in a while,” Martin said. “We want to win the conference and make it out of the first round of the playoffs. Another thing we’ve talked about is that we all want to win out, for the rest of the season. We believe we can.”
The Warhorses will travel to N.C. School of Science & Math for a 7 p.m. tipoff, Thursday, Jan. 9, as they play the first of seven straight conference games.
“We just have to keep trusting our coaches, who have done everything to get us to where we are right now,” Martin said. “I think if we keep trusting in what we’ve been doing, we’ll keep having the success we’ve had.”
Photos of Owen’s 69-63 victory over Brevard can be viewed in the gallery at the top of the page.