As far as the basketball playoff race is concerned, most districts in the Greater Houston area already have its four candidates for the playoffs.

But entering Saturday, that wasn't the case in 20-5A. 

Both Lamar and Westbury finished with an 8-8 record, so a tiebreaker game was played at Delmar Stadium Saturday afternoon. In the end – after a long-fought battle between rivals – Lamar lived to fight another day with a 74-70 victory.

Throughout most of the game Westbury appeared to be running the table, but a second-half surge by the Redskins aided in the pre-playoff win.

“It’s not so much what I said. They basically told themselves that they had to settle down and play better defense,” Lamar coach Kevin Wheeler said. “Westbury has a very good team. They are very active and very athletic. We had to better job of rebounding and finishing up our shots.”

Lamar will face 19-5A champion Eisenhower at 7 p.m. Tuesday at Butler Stadium.

And early on, the Rebels seemed to have control of that aspect of the game. The game started as a shootout between Lamar’s Josh Bonney and Westbury’s Roy Cooper. Bonney knocked down four 3-point baskets while Cooper drained five, all in the first half.

With a 39-34 advantage at halftime, the Redskins came out firing fast and early. Bonney, along with teammate Josh Leuchtag, led the team defensively and with scoring.

“We saw a little mismatch we had and we took advantage of it,” Wheeler said in regards to Leuchtag’s third-quarter performance. “I felt like that was one of the things to get us over the hump.”

Bonney finished the game with 39 points (seven 3-point baskets made) while Leuschtag finished with 16 points. Lamar’s DeAndre Crayton contributed 11.

For the Rebels, Cooper led the way with 21 points. Roman Blackmon and Charles Sims finished with 20 and 15 points respectively.

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