by DOUG KRETZ

The season was 1976. Feds Creek came in to the 15th Regional Tournament as the runnerup in the 60th District Tournament to Belfry and sported a 21-12 mark, a far cry from the previous season of 13-16. This was the first year for the Vikings under their new coach Sherman Combs.

Virgie came in to the 15th Regional Tournament under a first year coach also, in former Johns Creek and Morehead State great Eugene Lyons. The Eagles entered with a 21-7 mark and had won the 59th District Tournament. They had been runnersup in the Regional the previous year.

These two teams, Vikings and Eagles, were going to go at it. No one gave Feds Creek a chance to win. The Litkenhous ratings had Virgie rated as the #3 team in the Region behind Sheldon Clark and Betsy Layne. They rated the Vikings as # 7.

Each team played six players . Five of Virgie’s players were named Newsome.

That season there was but one player from the 15th Region who made the All State teams, Jackie Wireman of Johnson Central. There were a host of great players who were All State Honorable Mention selections that season. They were Jim Stepp and Steve Goble of Sheldon Clark, Bill Majakey of Paintsville, Ricky Roberts and Ronnie Clark of Betsy Layne, Larry Daugherty of McDowell, Jeff Goodson of Dorton, David Lyons of Johns Creek, Ricky Pack of Allen Central, Jeff Riley of Wheelwright and two who would play in this game in David Hunt of Feds Creek and Donnie Newsome of Virgie.

I can’t find predictions on the game in old newspapers but people have told me that the Vikings were certainly the underdogs going in. Virgie had been the pick to annihilate the Vikings in this first round game. One newspaper sports writer was said to give Feds Creek a .01% chance of victory. Well, that certainly isn’t much of a chance.

In that first round game Feds Creek played the part of Jack The Giant Killer when they took home the victory over Virgie, 74-70. That was the biggest upset in the 15th Regional that year.

Raymond Miller led Feds Creek in scoring that game with 24. Donnie Newsome, playing with a pulled hamstring, led Virgie with 23.

That was the first game of a mighty fine Regional Tourney in 1976, promising fans what was to come in the next few days. The rest of the tournament went thusly: 1st Round- Betsy Layne 69, Sheldon Clark 65. McDowell 73, Belfry 55. Johnson Central, champions of the Region the previous year, then had to go overtime to defeat Dorton 71-69. In the semifinals that 1976 season it was Betsy Layne taking the wind out of the sails of Feds Creek with a 59-44 victory and McDowell taking two overtimes to defeat Johnson Central 74-73. Betsy Layne then earned the right to a trip to the Sweet 16 with another close game. This one Betsy Layne 48, McDowell 47.

Looking over the Regional Tournament from that season one would think of the close games as the best of the seven games played-a two overtime game, an overtime game and a one point squeaker in the championship game as probably the ones that created the most talk as the tournament concluded and fans were leaving. However it was the Feds Creek upset in the first game of a very good Virgie team that still gets brought up in conversations 44 years later.

Maybe the sportswriter who gave Feds Creek a .01% chance of defeating Virgie had his numbers right but in all the wrong places.

– reprinted with permission of Mountain Sports Hall of Fame