Clinton, South Carolina, Friday, February 9, 2018, 10:18 a.m.

I must be getting old. I haven’t seen it all, but I’ve seen most of it. Perhaps I could estimate with some degree of accuracy all the stock car races and ballgames I’ve attended and described, but it would be a waste of time and probably leave me feeling even older than I am.

Last night I was in Woodruff, where Woodruff wasn’t playing. Woodruff High School was neutral. That’s why I was there.

Clinton was. The girls’ basketball team was breaking a tie with Chapman for third place in Region 3-3A, and the boys were settling the championship against Newberry. I went to Clinton High School more than forty years ago, and the alma mater remains accurate. My love has never failed, but, when I write about the Red Devils, I try to be fair. I’m a pro at this sportswriting business. I’m not particularly successful at it, but I keep right on trying.

As testimony to my objectivity, and, unfortunately, my age, Clinton lost both games, but I still had a good time. Chapman, a school located in Inman, where James Harvey Hylton also is, won the girls’ game, 46-40, and Newberry’s boys, located appropriately in Newberry, won, 72-60.

Both Red Devil quintets expended maximum effort. Both are going to the Class 3A playoffs. The Lady Red Devils (12-15) will visit Pendleton on Monday night, and the Red Devils (15-7) will play at home on Tuesday against either Pendleton or Seneca, depending on the outcome of a game between the two tonight.

The girls’ team is getting better, having won twice as many games this year after winning twice as many games last year as the year before. That’s 3-6-12 if you’re scoring the triple play at home.

The boys’ team, which advanced all the way to the upstate finals a year ago, tracked Newberry like radar this year before the Bulldogs got off the final torpedo. In the regular season, the two teams differed by a single point, Newberry winning at Clinton, 71-68, and Clinton winning at Newberry, 53-51.

The Red Devils are more graceful and frantic. The Bulldogs are taller and bulkier.

Newberry escaped in the third quarter. Clinton was almost out of ammunition — Vilo Boyd, Zay Hurley, and J.D. Payne all had accrued four fouls — in the fourth, but the Red Devils forced seven turnovers, got as close as six, and exhibited their usual herculean effort before succumbing.

The Clinton coaches, John Gardner with the girls and Eddie Romines with the boys, are great guys. In fact, the Newberry head coach, Chad Cary, is a great guy. I don’t know the Chapman girls’ coach, Leslie Boyd, but she seems really nice.

The Red Devils won the region last year. This year they fell ever so slightly short, but they’ve still got running, shooting, passing, bouncing, and jumping to do.

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