Picture courtesy of Tanner Colvin
NEWTON — Greyson Jones had waited his whole high school career to celebrate a championship, and on Tuesday night he finally got the chance.
Jones and his Salina Central teammates claimed their first league championship in nearly a decade Tuesday night with dominating 62-42 victory over Newton, gaining a share of the Ark Valley Chisholm Trail League Division II title with Andover.
“It feels great,” said Jones, Central’s 6-foot-6 center and one of six seniors on a Mustang team that now has won six straight games heading into Thursday’s regular season finale at home against Campus. “We’ve accomplished big, and it just feels good.”
“It feels like the hard work has paid off. Since the summer, we’ve been grinding.”
Senior Greyson Jones
With their current winning streak, the Mustangs are now 14-8 overall for the season and finished with a 10-2 league mark while securing their first winning record since going 17-6 in 2018-19. The league championship was their first since winning AVCTL Division I in 2016-17.
“It’s been nine years, and we had to win the last six league games to get it done,” said Central coach Chris Fear, in his second season leading the boys program after a successful run as girls coach. “It’s quite an accomplishment after a really slow start to the season.”
“I’m really happy. Our seniors have been such great leaders. They had three coaches in four years, so to bring our team to this just says a ton about their leadership and their toughness, and I couldn’t be more proud of them and happy for the whole team, but specifically our seniors.”
Head coach Chris Fear
With only one full-time starter back from last year’s 8-13 team, Central has relied on breakout seasons from Jones and sophomores Kaeden Nienke and Grant Ostmeyer. Seniors Noah Peck, the lone returning starter, and Gannon Cole round out the starting lineup, but the Mustangs also have received key contributions from seniors Thomas Payne, Angel McMurray and Jordan Edwards, as well as sophomore Eli Kreighbaum.
“The biggest difference this year has been our mentality and physicality, realizing as long as we crash the boards, play defense and communicate, that the offense is going to catch up,” said Nienke, who leads the team in scoring with 16.5 points per game after averaging just 2.3 as a freshman. “I’m very confident in our team.”
Sophomore Kaeden Nienke
Jones, who averaged 4.3 points and 2.7 rebounds in a reserve role last year, has elevated his game and is a close second to Nienke in scoring at 16.4 points per game while leading the team in rebounding at 5.4.
“My biggest difference, I would say, is I’ve been trying to score more and making more of an impact on the scoreboard,” said Jones, who scored 12 of his 16 points in the second half against Newton and grabbed nine rebounds. “And to get rebounds and blocks and see my teammates and set them up.”
Ostmeyer, another member of a strong Mustang sophomore class, averages 11.3 points and had 12 in the Newton game.
The Mustangs look to keep the momentum going into the postseason Thursday against Campus.
“We have gotten pretty confident, day after day,” Jones said. “We’ve been working hard in practice and filling our roles.”
“(The goal is) to go as far as we can.”
Fear appreciates the growth from a team that got off to a rocky 1-4 start to the season but has gone 13-4 since then.
“They have really matured,” he said. “We had a lot of people playing different spots, different roles, to begin the year. And we’ve really kind of learned how to finish games, and right now they’re very confident in each other.”
“The last game is Thursday, and then you get into the sub-state, where you can’t lose or your season’s over with. But I think it’s going to take somebody really playing well to beat us.”
