LA GRANGE — Following back-to-back league losses and the regular season winding down North Lenoir’s boys basketball team isn’t in panic mode yet, but a win would go a long way.
The Hawks’ next chance comes against the conference’s top team.
North Lenoir, which fell from a tie for first to second following losses to Clayton Cleveland and C.B. Aycock, hosts first-place Erwin Triton in a key Eastern Carolina 3A Conference game tonight.
North Lenoir (9-9, 4-2) fell big at Cleveland, 62-46, on Jan. 18 before a late collapse against the Golden Falcons on Tuesday cost them first place.
Triton (14-3, 5-1) comes into Wooten Gymnasium today — a make-up game following Friday’s postponement — with a one-game lead on the Hawks looking to push it to two.
“Right now, we control our own destiny and that’s what I’ve been telling the guys — that all you have to is win and it’ll take care of itself,” North Lenoir coach Anthony Loftin said.
“The problem is, we don’t have that many ballgames because we have six games left. If we can finish off winning these last six, we’ll be right there where we want to be.
“It’s not in panic mode yet, but we definitely need to play better.”
Loftin noted that in North Lenoir’s last two losses his team failed to do “the little things” to be successful.
Against the Rams, who are in a three-way tie for third with C.B. Aycock and Southern Wayne, Loftin said his team never really got going. At home against the Falcons, North Lenoir went a span of 6:38 in the fourth quarter without scoring as the Falcons went on to win 45-39.
To knock off Triton — which shares the Hawks moniker — Loftin knows his team is going to have to learn from the past two games as well as forget about them.
“We’ve worked hard (on some things this week) in practice,” Loftin said. “We got to come out there with a better effort than we did the last game out.
“Our goal is to win the championship. We want to win the conference championship,” Loftin added.
“That’s still in reach, you know, but we’re going to have to play better.”
Ryan Herman can be reached at 252-559-1073 or Ryan.Herman@Kinston.com. Follow him on Twitter: @KFPSports.