A former doormat showed its firepower in Valley’s largest boys basketball rivalry game
Thinking back on how far his team has come, Meridian High boys basketball coach Jeff Sanor can’t help but smile and gaze off into the distance.
The former Boise State and Washington basketball player inherited a struggling program three years ago. But since then, he’s turned the former doormat into a team fighting for first place in the 5A Southern Idaho Conference and one earning respect across the state.
The No. 3-ranked Warriors showed why Friday, overcoming a slow start and grinding out a 72-52 victory over Mountain View in the 15th annual Stinky Sneaker rivalry game.
The win earned Meridian (11-1, 8-1 5A SIC) its 10th straight victory in a still young season. It used to take the Warriors years to rack up double-digit wins.
“I’m smiling because I’m thinking of all the butts that I’ve chewed,” Sanor said with a laugh before crediting the past two senior classes for changing the culture at Meridian. “… It’s coming in and letting these guys see a picture of something that’s awesome. And then never letting them settle for anything less than their absolute best.”
An underdog entering Friday, Mountain View (3-10, 2-8) committed to grounding the high-flying Warriors. It forced them out of their fastbreak offense and into a slug-it-out, halfcourt game where the Warriors had to run their sets 30 feet from the basket.
But Meridian stayed patient, racked up the Mavericks’ foul count and converted at the free-throw line, sinking 28-of-35 free throws (80 percent).
Meridian nursed a four-point lead at halftime. It never trailed again, making 12-of-25 shots from the floor and 5-of-9 3-pointers in the second half to run away.
“We just stuck to the game plan that we had,” said senior Donovan Sanor, who finished with 18 points. “We never deviated from that. Our goal is just to run teams off the floor. And I think eventually in that fourth quarter, their legs started dying on them and their shots stopped falling.”
That patience and mental toughness was in short supply when Jeff Sanor took over the program. The Warriors started to turn the corner that first year, going 14-10 for their first winning season since 2005-06. Meridian then followed it up with another winning season at 13-10 last year.
That momentum fed into this winter, when Meridian returned four starters and is almost assured to surpass those win totals with nine regular-season games left.
“The group of guys that we have has a lot of experience,” said Meridian junior Joe Mpoyo, who scored a game-high 20 points. “In previous years, guys used to not really take basketball seriously. The group that we have right now, we take it seriously. It is our priority to win.”
But larger goals remain. Meridian can avenge its only loss of the year at 6 p.m. Saturday at No. 1 Rocky Mountain (12-1, 10-0). A win there would put the Warriors in strong position for their first regular-season conference title since 1991-92.
And Meridian is still searching for its first state tournament berth since 2006, the longest drought of any 5A team in the state.
The Warriors looked like a shoe-in to make it to state last year after entering the district tournament as the No. 3 seed. But back-to-back upsets resulted in a two-and-out performance and another March sitting on the couch.
“We want to right the ship,” Donovan Sanor said. “We know we should have won those two games (last year), been at state and possibly made a run. But that was just an unfortunate two games, and so we’re just taking it one game at a time.”
Meridian also won the Stinky Sneaker spirit contest Friday for the 10th straight year in a gym nearly packed to its capacity of 3,028. The winner of the spirit contest, not the game, keeps the trophy of an old Chuck Taylor sneaker.
This story was originally published January 18, 2020 at 12:26 AM.
