Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, March 13, 1994                   TAG: 9403130149
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: E-10   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: RAY COX STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: CHARLOTTESVILLE                                LENGTH: Medium

SPARTANS HARDLY DREAMED AA TITLE COULD BE A REALITY

After the Spartans had dusted local favorite Louisa County 67-59 on Saturday at University Hall for the last victory of the year and 14th in a row, Salem guard Mark Byington mentioned how the thought of a state crown really didn't dawn on him until late December.

"I always thought we'd win some games and have a pretty good year in our district [Blue Ridge] and maybe even in our region," he said. "But about midway through the year, we started playing so well that I started thinking about the state."

In Byington's estimation, there were a couple of watershed events for the team. One was the Advance Auto Parts Classic.

"When we won that at our place, we found out we could be pretty good," he said. "There were a lot of good teams in that."

Among them were Northside, Laurel Park and Cave Spring, but all of them were done for the year before Saturday, Northside the victim of the Spartans for the sixth-straight time in a 63-59 overtime loss in Friday's semifinals.

The other turning point for Salem, in Byington's view, was the 62-60 loss to Cave Spring during the regular season.

"The feeling of losing was so terrible that it made us work all that much harder," Byington said. "We never wanted to have that feeling again."

It was Louisa that was left feeling a little green around the gills after Salem got through with it.

"Before the game, they were I always thought we'd win some games and have a pretty good year in our district [Blue Ridge] and maybe even in our region," he said. "But about midway through the year, we started playing so well that I started thinking about the state. Mark Byington Salem guard telling us that we looked like a soccer team," said Salem's Matt Woolwine, who battled bigger players all afternoon on the way to scoring 16 points, including 10-for-14 free-throw shooting, and hauling in a game-high 13 rebounds.

Louisa's players didn't bring up the subject of soccer because they thought the Spartans had big feet. The reference was to Salem's outwardly bookish and suburban appearance.

"I told the guys [the Spartans] if they thought we were soccer players, then we'd show them by going out and kicking their butts," Salem coach Charlie Morgan said.

Level-headed as always, Byington wasn't paying much attention to any personal slights from the other team.

"If you're going to get fired up for a state championship game, then you don't need what somebody else says to you to do it," he said.

Perhaps Salem's guys weren't street-corner types, but they definitely came equipped with a serious attitude. Take Woolwine, who was jerked in the second half so Morgan could chastise him on the sideline for making threatening gestures at one of his opponents.

"I think the guy wanted to start a fight," Woolwine said. "I just walked away."

Beg your pardon?

"You don't think I started that?" said Woolwine, his best pacifistic demeanor firmly in place. "I always walk away."

There was no place to which Ryan Reeves could walk away and hide after the game. The Salem reserve had pledged his prized sideburns to the cause, and the toll had come due. Somebody produced shears. To see these amateurs whacking away on a teammate's head was disconcerting, to say the least.

Noting the surreality of the scene, second-stringer Mike Jefferys yelled, "Twelve guys just won the state championship, and they've got a razor in their hands!"

Nobody suggested disarmament, although the insurance underwriters probably would have counseled that that was the wisest course. But Salem had lived dangerously before. By Saturday, they were too tired to care.

"We're all exhausted," said Byington, one of six players who saw most of the action all year. "But when there's a state championship to play for . . ."

Charlie Morgan's brother Richard, a Salem assistant and former University of Virginia player who had called this floor home, said the high school's victory rivaled his greatest emotional overloads at UVa.

"Right up there with beating North Carolina," he said.

Never mind Carolina, Morgan hadn't planned on being here this year.

"I never thought we'd get this far," he said. "I'm sure the players didn't either. When people asked me, I just told them we were glad to be here.

"All the players wanted was a chance to compete."