On Tuesday, Dec. 7, the Armadillos hosted the Goldthwaite Eagles. The Dillos took a first quarter lead 14-10. In the second quarter the Eagles clawed their way back in it and trailed the Dillos by one at the half 27-26. In the third quarter the Dillo defense did a good job and held the Eagles to two points and led the Eagles 39-28 at the end of three quarters. In the fourth quarter the Dillos preserved their lead and outscored Goldthwaite 10-9. The Dillos won the game 49-37. I was real proud of our defense. Tucker Cromer and Luke Cox led the Dillos in rebounding. Luke Cox had 7 rebounds and Tucker Cromer had 9 rebounds. J.T. Mathis led the team in assists with four, and Luke Cox and Clayton Perry had 3 steals each. Scoring for the Dillos: Luke Cox - 13, Ryan Pannell - 12, Tucker Cromer - 11, J.T. Mathis - 5, Zack Davis - 4, Celestino Aquirre - 2, Clayton Perry - 2.

On Thursday, Dec. 9, the Dillos traveled to the Hamilton Tournament. It was a good tournament for us because there was plenty of good competition at the tournament. We opened the tournament with Crawford, playing at 9:30 a.m. Crawford was the best team we have faced up to this point this year. We played well the first quarter and were tied after one quarter,14-14. In the second quarter, our offense stalled out a little bit and Crawford went up on us 34-21 at the half. With another quarter very similar to the second quarter for the Dillos, Crawford went up 50-26 after three quarters and ended up winning the game 58-32. I was proud of our three point shooting this game. We were 7 of 16 from the three-point line with Luke Cox hitting 3, Clayton Perry hitting 2 and J.T. Mathis hitting 2. We struggled a little with our inside game against Crawford, scoring only six points from the paint. Scoring for the Dillos: Clayton Perry-10, Luke Cox-9, J.T. Mathis-7, Ryan Pannell, Tucker Cromer and Jose Vega had 2 pts. each.

In our second game of the day, we had an hour and a half rest before we played Rio Vista. This was a very physical game. The difference in the game was Rio Vistas three point shooting and rebounding. They were 7 of 19 from the three and we were 1 of 6. Rio Vista out rebounded us 22-37 and had 20 offensive rebounds. We gave them too many second and third attempts from not blocking out well. Rio Vista won the game 58-41. Scoring for the Dillos: Luke Cox-14; Tucker Cromer-13; Jose Vega-7; Zack Davis-3; Ryan Pannel, J.T. Mathis-2.

On the second day of the tournament we played Meridian. The Dillo Defense played well once again and we held Meridian to 16 points for the entire game. Dillos won 33-16. Scoring for the Dillos: Ryan Pannell-16; Luke Cox-8; Celestino Aguirre-4; Clayton Perry-3; Tucker Cromer, Jose Vega and Zack Davis-2 each.

In our second of the second day we played Eastland. Eastland is another very talented team with a very talented 6'10" player that has been heavily recruited by many big 12 teams. We didn't shoot the ball very well against Eastland. Our shooting percentage was 18%. Eastland won the game 54-22. Scoring for the Dillos: Luke Cox-10; J.T. Mathis-4; Tucker Cromer-3; and Zack Davis-2.

On the third day of the Tournament we faced one of our district opponents in the consolation bracket. We played Hamilton at 8:00 a.m. Saturday morning. We started off well going up 81-1 and then ended the first quarter 18-4. As the game went on I thought we got tired a little bit and Hamilton just chipped away at our lead. Going into the fourth quarter the Dillos still led by seven, but Hamilton fought their way back into it and tied it up 40-40 at the end of regulation. In overtime Hamilton went up by four points and with time running out we had to start fouling and they hit a few of their free throws and ended up winning 45-42 in OT.

It was good to get 5 games in three days but it takes a toll on you when you have to leave at 6 or 7 a.m. to play a game at 8 or 9 a.m. I just thought we got tired and that had an effect on how we performed. We will have played Brady on December 14 when this article comes out. We will travel to Burnet on Friday, December 17. When we come back from Christmas break, we will start district play with Early coming to town on December 31.