Raiders, Tornado face makeups

While most area high school basketball teams are winding their regular seasons down and getting ready for district tournaments, Baylor and McCallie find themselves scrambling to get their games in.

The Red Raiders and Blue Tornado, each 4-2 in the Division II-AA East/Middle Region, have had to reschedule games because of bad weather recently. The other six schools in the region are in the Nashville area, so getting games in has been a problem with both ice and snow canceling schools in recent weeks.

"It's been difficult," said Baylor coach Austin Clark, whose Red Raiders played three region games last week. "We've had to make up some games and, as a result, have had to put the kids in some difficult situations."

The Raiders responded with wins over McCallie and Father Ryan before falling to first-place Ensworth.

"I'm proud of the kids," Clark said. "This league is very good, and every night is competitive."

Both Chattanooga schools have two region games remaining that will help determine their postseason seeding. The Tornado (15-4) are scheduled to travel to Nashville to play Father Ryan on Friday and Montgomery Bell Academy on Saturday. Baylor (14-7) is set to visit MBA on Friday and host Battle Ground Academy next Monday.

"We're hoping to get the games in, but they're calling for snow, so we'll have to see how that goes," McCallie coach Dan Wadley said. "We might have to go up there next week."

The Nashville-area region members play each other twice and the Chattanooga schools once each, meaning they have 12 region games, whereas Baylor and McCallie play each other twice and the Nashville schools once apiece for a total of eight games. Postseason seeding is determined by percentages within the region.

"We're obviously disappointed by our losses, but we're happy about where we are now," Wadley said. "We could finish as high as second in this region and would get a bye (for the state tournament). Either way, we shouldn't finish lower than fifth and will host a first-round game."

Said Clark: "We're at a little disadvantage as far as the seeding goes, but all we can do is play every game as hard as we can. We're all fighting for second -- everybody's chasing Ensworth -- but regular-season wins give you a better seeding and a chance to host, which is motivation to win in the regular season, so we'll continue to work hard in every practice and every game."