SOUTH ROYALTON — White River Valley senior Troy Walker is part bulldozer, part basketball player. He’s built like a football lineman, with a dangerous set of silky-smooth hands around the basket. It’s the kind of combination that even a bad cold, apparently, can’t slow down.
Walker, feeling under the weather the past few days, said he felt sick during the anthem before No. 7-seeded White River Valley’s VPA Division III opening-round victory, 66-47, against No. 10 Stowe on Wednesday night. He gathered himself and scored a game-high 24 points in the first playoff victory of his varsity career.
“The last two days have been really bad, today it’s gotten a little better,” said Walker, a senior who transferred to South Royalton from Rochester last year, of his cold. “Either way, I was going to play, just what happened during the game I wasn’t really sure about. … I just pushed through it.
“It feels great, this is actually my first-ever playoff win ever. It feels really good.”
Wildcat freshman Dominic Craven added nine points on three 3-pointers, and Eddie Bray also scored nine for the team’s fourth straight victory since Feb. 18. Stowe finishes its season 9-12 overall.
“It’s funny, Troy’s been out the last two days — he’s sick — and we weren’t sure if he was going to play tonight,” White River Valley head coach Mike Gaudette said. “He weathered it tonight, he toughed it out. He provided us with a lot of senior leadership.
“I was nervous; I was texting him today like, ‘Are you OK?’ He played great tonight.”
White River Valley will travel to No. 2 Hazen (17-3), which had a first-round bye, on Saturday in the D-III quarterfinals. The Wildcats fell, 56-51, to Hazen in the only regular-season meeting between the teams this winter.
“We have our work cut out against (Hazen),” Gaudette said. “I think we’re confident right now. If we can cut down on those dry patches, like you saw tonight, we’ll be OK. I like our chances, especially with the way we’re playing right now.”
Against the Raiders, White River Valley’s dominance showed up in bunches.
Stowe, which entered the tournament having lost two of its last three games, took a 16-15 lead into the second quarter thanks to a circus 3-pointer by junior Maxwell McKenna from close to the center court Wildcat logo at the buzzer.
Then the Wildcats took over, outscoring the Raiders 21-6 before halftime. Bray led White River Valley with five points in the second stanza, helping the Wildcats take a comfortable 36-22 lead into the intermission.
“A new coach, a lot of new players,” Walker said. “The more we’ve played together, the better we’ve been getting. … I’m really proud of the way the guys played tonight.”
Stowe responded to start the second half, going on a 12-2 run to cut White River Valley’s lead to four points. A 3-pointer by Stowe junior Rashane Russell cut the lead to three points a minute later. McKenna finished the game with a team-high 16 points for Stowe; Rashane Russell added 11 points and Roshawn Russell scored eight.
The Raiders never got closer than that. White River Valley finished the third quarter on a 12-2 run of its own and outscored Stowe, 14-8, in the fourth to secure the victory.
“A month ago, we wouldn’t have been able to weather that storm,” Gaudette said of Stowe’s comeback in the third quarter. “That’s how much we’ve grown. … We took some bad shots, we rushed it. … The kids did a nice job; they’ve matured a lot in the last month.
“Before, we used to look at Troy (Walker) — he’s been the leading scorer for years,” he added. “Now, we don’t look so much at Troy. We’ve had kids like Dominic Craven, a freshman, he’s stepped up. Jake Hewitt was awesome tonight. He played like a senior. … That was his best game of the year.”
Check another box in a long list of firsts for the first-year White River Valley program, a product of last year’s merger between South Royalton High and Whitcomb. Gaudette, the former coach at Mascoma and Hartford, said he’s been impressed by the way his team has handled the changes around it — new colors, a new mascot, new teammates, a new school. Better yet, the Wildcats have saved their best basketball for last.
“I was hired late; I didn’t meet these kids until Nov. 26,” Gaudette said. “It’s been these two schools coming together, we’ve been getting better and better each week. I think it’s their confidence. They’ve bought into the system.
“We’re peaking right now, at the right time.”
Saturday’s quarterfinal is scheduled for 2 p.m. The winner will take on either No. 3 Thetford or No. 6 BFA-Fairfax next Thursday in the D-III semifinals at the Barre Auditorium.
Josh Weinreb can be reached at jweinreb@vnews.com or 603-727-3306.