“The best quote I ever heard was out of a high school coach down there in Georgia — ‘You build for next year this year.’ I think there’s a lot of truth in that,” said Bingham, East’s first-year head coach. “That’s what we’re going to try to do. We’re going to play all these young-uns, especially my guards. They need so much experience, Haley and Sarah, it’s unreal. They just need to play all they can play, because next year we don’t have Brooke (Misenheimer) and Nicole (Loggins).”

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East is even younger in experience at this point than it is in class age.

Seniors Tiffany Poole and Mary Clark Roberts, who are among East’s first seven players, are basically undergoing their baptism of fire in heated SPCbasketball, although they have had outstanding careers in other sports — Roberts in track and tennis, Poole in softball and volleyball.

Three more key Mustangs — juniors Lora Williams, Stephanie Morgan and Emily Rich — played some last season, but were role players on a star-laden team.

“A big part of our team — except for Nicole (Loggins) and me are almost like freshmen experience-wise right now,” said Misenheimer after East lost a bitter struggle with Northwest Cabarrus on Friday. “But they’ll all do fine the second time around the league. We’re going to start coming out on top in the close games and beating the people we should beat.”

The last couple of seasons, West has played its second game of the campaign with North Rowan in January — smack in the middle of the conference schedule for both teams.

But this season, the two teams have already finished their home-and-home affairs with West Rowan taking a pair of unbelievable games. Most recently there was an 82-81 decision at North in a game West trailed by 11 with two minutes to play.

“West-North has gotten to be such a big rivalry that neither one of us really needs a game that emotional in the middle of our conference games,” said West coach Mike Gurley. “Thank goodness that North is 2A. We don’t have to worry about them in the playoffs. Now we can cheer for each other the rest of the season.”

Unless, of course, the twin powers meet for a third time in the upcoming Christmas Tournament. The really amazing thing is that as good as West and North are, Davie County (which is also mighty good) might still be seeded No. 1 in the tournament.

Both Davie and West are 9-0. The Falcons have one game remaining prior to the tournament, while Davie has two. If Davie goes 11-0, it will be the No. 1 seed. That could mean a No. 2 versus No. 3 Round 3 for North and West in the tourney semifinals.

That one would rock Goodman Gymnasium to its foundation.

“I would love another shot at West Rowan,” said Phillips, who scored 37 in a finals loss to the Falcons in the championship game last year.

“I don’t want payback against Scooter Sherrill or anything like that. I just want to show them we can play too.”

Phillips threw in 31 on Friday when Davie engulfed Alexander Central by a huge margin.

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CHANGEDMENU: At almost the last minute, Odessa, the Canadian high school that was supposed to be in the Domino’s Hoops Classic that Davie will host later this week, backed out.

Davie had a devil of a time replacing Odessa, calling a reported 50 schools in search of a replacement. But everyone was booked or had already scheduled their maximum number of games.

Finally, Davie enlisted Bishop McGuinness, a private school in Winston-Salem, to fill the void. The War Eagles had a tough time with McGuinness in a season-opening tournament at the Joel Coliseum.

North Rowan’s boys will be glad to get 6-4 senior swingman Mario Sturdivant back in harness after a week of Shrine Bowl commitments.