MILFORD — Trey Strong left it all out on the Milford High School gymnasium floor Monday night. Literally.
And so did the rest of the New Miami boys basketball team.
Strong scored a game-high 26 points — dropping seven 3-pointers — in the Vikings’ 68-43 Division VII tournament loss to the CCPA Lions.
“Coming into the game, my job was to just shoot the ball, really,” said Strong, a freshman. “Every time I touch it, I try to throw it up. That’s what I did tonight, and it worked.”
Strong did throw it up.
Late in the fourth quarter, the 5-foot-7 guard vomited in the middle of Milford’s gym floor before officials called a timeout for cleanup.
Strong, who had scored 23 points in 26 minutes of action, hit a nearby garbage can to get the rest of it out. He went to the bench to regroup with his New Miami teammates and was sent back out on the court.
Strong said a play was drawn up for him on the Vikings’ next possession. He came around a couple screens, received a kickout pass and drained his last 3-pointer of the night as the clock was winding down.
“It’s not the first time he’s thrown up,” New Miami second-year coach Dillon McCullough said. “I think we’ve got to start making him throw up more because when he throws up, he goes unconscious.”
McCullough said Strong upchucked during a junior varsity game this season and scored 37 points.
“I get nervous sometimes,” Strong said. “I drink too much water, too.”
It was Strong who scored New Miami’s first five points after CCPA moved out to a 14-0 lead with 1:45 left in the opening quarter.
The Lions forced 20 Viking turnovers in the first half and owned a 31-12 lead at the halftime break. CCPA led by as many as 31 in the third quarter and closed it out in the fourth.
A tough season
New Miami (2-21) lost 12 in a row to close out its season. The Vikings beat Dayton Jefferson and Covington Latin in the regular season for their only victories.
“It was a lot of ups and downs — a lot of outside sources breaking into the inner circle,” senior Dalson Hayes described New Miami’s season. “You should never let other people break into your inner circle and mess up your team chemistry.
“This isn’t how I wanted my senior year to go, but at the end of the day, I love these guys. I wouldn’t want to play with nobody else. I’m a Village boy until I die.”
The takeaway
The Lions snapped a four-game losing streak against the Vikings. New Miami and CCPA last played when the Vikings won 65-57 in the tournament in 2020-21.
The Lions had 10 players hit the scoring column. Jacion Johnson scored a team-high 13 points, Kenyon Revels had 11 and JayMear Davis added 10.
Who’s coming back?
New Miami brings back six of its eight players listed on the tournament roster for next season. The Vikings graduate seniors Carter Sanford, Jason Wyatt and Dalson Hayes.
Up next
CCPA (15-5) has won five in a row and faces No. 5 Lockland at 6 p.m. Thursday at Lakota West.
