Early in the season, the Polar Springs Atomics Boys Basketball Team was able to accomplish one feat the program hasn’t achieved in 45 years.
“We won our county Christmas tournament back in December and that was the first time since 1975, it seems like everything traces back to the mid-’70s and we’re trying to change that to have some more recent memories,” says Poplar Springs head boys basketball coach Jared Owen.
A player who is helping the Atomics play for a chance to write its name in the history books is Zaimes Hall. The senior is first in the state for 3-pointers by any player in the state, scoring 103 this season already. He is ranked second nationally for 3-pointers.
“It seems like in our biggest games, that’s whenever he shows up he had 48 on Dell County he’s had multiple 30 plus point games on some of the better teams we’ve played,” Owen said.
Hall is in the top 20 in the state for overall scoring, but the senior said he isn’t aiming to make his name climb on the leaderboard.
“When everybody started telling me, I mean it’s in the back of your head, but you don’t really, you try not to think about it, because you don’t want to put any extra pressure on yourself,” Hall said.
The extra hours Zaimes has spent in the gym putting up shots have been spent with his Dad, Brad Hall, who is back as an assistant coach this season after spending nine years as the Atomics’ head coach that ended in 2015.
“It’s been a joy and something I know 30 years down the road I can look back on and be glad I was apart of it,” Brad Hall said.
Though Coach Hall is very proud of his son’s performance on the court, he said it’s how Zaimes carried himself both in games and in life that’s most important.
“The biggest thing I like is his faith in God and he puts that first and his play demonstrates that,” Coach Hall said.
Poplar Springs will host Holmes County on Friday, January 22, 2021 and travel to Vernon on Tuesday, January 26.
Last season, the Poplar Springs boys basketball team won just seven games in what they considered a rebuilding year. This season, they have already almost doubled that win column with a 13-4 record.
In 2019, the Atomics made it to the state playoffs for the first time since 1975 and now they are aiming to do that again and then some.
“Now we’re chasing after a district championship, so we got the playoffs checked off and so that’s where our sites are set, we’re just trying to do things that haven’t been done in a while,” Poplar Springs head boys basketball coach Jared Owen said.
