The W.S. Neal Eagle varsity boys basketball team had an extra reason to give thanks for Thanksgiving as on the final day of the Flomaton Thanksgiving Wednesday, the Eagles picked up their first win of the season.
After falling to 0-2 in the tournament and 0-4 overall this season Tuesday night with an 81-56 loss at the hands of the Excel Panthers, the Eagles went into their Thanksgiving holidays with a 43-34 win over J.U. Blacksher to improve to 1-4 this season.
W.S. Neal will be back in action Tuesday at home against Flomaton. Game time is set for 4:30 p.m.

Tuesday: Excel 81, W.S. Neal 56
Leading by one point at the half, 34-33 over Excel Tuesday, the W.S. Neal Eagles saw the game get away in the third quarter and in the second half as they lost to the Excel Panthers by 25 points Tuesday, 81-56.
Leading by one at the half, Excel outscored the Eagles 48-22 in the second half including a 23-9 romp over the Eagles in the third quarter.
The explosive third quarter for the Panthers turned a one-point Eagle lead into a 13-point advantage for the Panthers, 56-43. The third quarter for Excel saw a 15-0 run for the Panthers.
In the fourth quarter, Excel outscored W.S. Neal 25-13 to get the win by 25 points.
W.S. Neal led 19-17 after the first quarter.
“The kids fight and my heart fights with them. I love the fact that I have some resilient kids that hurt right now, but we fight. That is all I wanted this year to start out with at first as a foundation. I am so proud in the way our kids play,” first-year W.S. Neal Eagle head coach Kasson Whitten said. “They do it the right way with integrity and they instill the fundamentals of the game that are there now. That does not reap a whole lot of rewards right now with what our record is showing. But I am thinking in the long run, we are going to be really good and really tough to beat. So I am so proud of our kids and the way they fought and the direction we are going in. Right now I have a lot of kids hurting because they could taste victory. It was so close. But we are going to get there.”
In the loss for the Eagles, Excel shot a total of 31 free throws while making 22. W.S. Neal was 7-for-16 from the free throw line in the loss.
The Eagles had three players in double figures with Donovan Millican and Jalen Harrod leading the way with 16 points each. Josiah Nettles added 10 points in the loss while Hudson Brown added seven points.
Tavin Ingrahm had four points, Trevor Burns had two points and Derrick Hodges had one point.
Nettles had six rebounds and Millican added two. Harrod had one in the loss.

Wednesday: WSN 43, J.U. Blacksher 34
After starting the season 0-4, the W.S. Neal Eagles picked up their first win of the season Wednesday against J.U. Blacksher 43-34 on the final day of the Flomaton Thanksgiving Tournament.
W.S. Neal trailed early in the game 10-2 and 14-11 after the first quarter before using a 7-0 run in the second quarter a 3-pointer by Hudson Brown to break an 18-18 tie and lead 21-18 at the half.
In the third quarter, W.S. Neal again used a 7-0 run and outscored Blacksher 9-6 in the quarter to hold a 30-24 lead heading into the fourth.
In the fourth quarter, W.S. Neal held a 13-10 advantage over the Bulldogs to get the win by nine points.
“It feels good to get the first win, but we have such a long ways to go,” Whitten said. “We are not yet fundamentally sound, but we play hard. That is where I think the win came from. We gutted it out. As I said before, I appreciate the team and what they give every night for each other. Blacksher has come a long ways as well. Our opponent was not a kick over. They played just as hard as we did. I hate the fact that one of us had to lose today, but our kids did the things needed and gutted it out. Their team is going to be a program on the rise too. I think give both of our programs time, we will be good for awhile.”
Harrod led the Eagles with 12 points in the win and Nettles had 10 points.
Millican chipped in eight points and Brown had six. Hodges added four points while Ingrahm had two and Nick Straiton had one.
Both W.S. Neal and J.U. Blacksher shot 2-for-11 from the free throw line in the game.