Winning a conference is never easy, but the Destiny Christian boys basketball team made it look effortless after taking two wins and the Sooner Christian Conference crown. 

The Wildcats (16-2) continued an impressive season last weekend that’s seen three players eclipse the 1,000 career point mark.

On Friday, they started their march to the conference championship at Liberty Academy in Shawnee against the Life Christian Eagles.

Any ideas the Eagles had of making this a quality matchup by scoring first were immediately dismissed by the Wildcats.

Destiny Christian’s press took total control of the matchup with their full court press on their way to a commanding 23-0 run.

During the run, the team forced 5 straight turnovers while not allowing Life Christian to score for a little over six minutes.

"It’s tough because you want to play hard, but you also want to have good sportsmanship," said Destiny Christian Head Coach Chris Hamel.

That dilemma would become a recurring event for Hamel on the weekend.

By the end of the first quarter, Destiny Christian led 29-6. Life Christian wasn’t actually shooting the ball poorly going 3-7 on the shots they actually got up, but they didn’t get many turning the ball over 11 times in the opening quarter.

The Wildcats weren’t just erupting defensively. Their offense was humming along as well. They hit their first 12 shots from inside of 3-point range and didn’t miss a shot inside the 3-point line until 3:50 remaining in the second quarter.

It was a balanced attack for Destiny Christian with 10 players scoring in the first half and 6 players scoring 4 points or more.

"That’s been our strength all year," said Hamel. "If they focus on two or three guys, we have others who can step up."

Destiny Christian led 41-14 at halftime. Senior guard Boston Mims led the way with 7 points on 2-3 shooting field and a rebound. Senior forward Logan Batley had 5 points, a rebound and a block on 2-2 shooting from the field.

The third quarter was the closest the game ever came to being competitive, scoreboard aside. Destiny Christian got a tad bit sloppy and the Eagles took the advantage for a brief moment.

The Wildcats were still winning the quarter 6-4 when another large run was sparked at the end of the third quarter. The Wildcats would go on to win 66-20 over the Eagles.

The Wildcats defense was tremendous forcing 23 turnovers and 7-23 shooting from the field while not letting the Eagles hit a 3-pointer on the night (0-4).

Senior guard Nathan Logan led all players in scoring with 11 points, 5 steals, 2 rebounds and an assist.

Mims ended his night with 9 points, 4 assists and a steal. Senior forward Colton Hamel also added in 9 points, 7 rebounds, an assist and a steal.

All 13 players scored for the Wildcats on the night.

The final game

Day 2 saw the Wildcats matched up against the Lawton Christian Crusaders (12-5) in the championship game.

Lawton Christian sported an all-conference team tandem in Reggie Neal and Albert Arrendondo, and although Arrendondo spent most of the first quarter on the bench with foul trouble, Destiny Christian didn’t capitalize to the frustration of Coach Hamel.

"I feel like we started the game sluggish, and honestly we’re being a little lazy."

The game was tied at 5 most of the quarter and the entire time Arrendondo was sitting on the pine.

It was actually when he returned that Destiny Christian made its move. A 9-0 run to end the quarter helped the Wildcats take a 16-8 lead after a quarter of play.

The second quarter is when things got out of hand for the Crusaders. The Wildcats ratcheted up their full-court man press to force the Crusaders into 9 turnovers catapulting the Wildcats into a 20-3 run.

Logan was the main catalyst netting 3 steals in the chaos and deflecting several other passes. By halftime, the lead had ballooned up to 44-22 for Destiny Christian.

"Defense is something that I like to really get into early in the game," said Logan. "It gets me going on both sides of the court so I want to be real aggressive, and it opened up a lot for me and my teammates getting easy baskets and layups."

Hamel led all scorers with 11 points adding 4 rebounds and 2 assists. Logan put in 10 points and 2 assists to go with his 3 steals.

Arrendondo rebounded from his foul trouble to drop in 9 points and 3 rebounds.

The second half was largely played to just about a draw. Destiny Christian eased off the gas a bit, but the Crusaders never made a run back into the game.

The Wildcats won the Sooner Christian Conference by beating the Crusaders 68-40.

Hamel led the way with 19 points and 7 rebounds and felt like the team showed well in the tournament and fought off some past bouts of laziness.

"We couldn’t get lazy which we had problems with a couple of weeks ago," said Hamel. "I feel like the team played good. We played discipline and we played good defense."

Batley had 13 points and 11 rebounds as well.

Logan and Hamel took home all-tournament selections for their work on the weekend. Logan, Mims, Hamel and Batley all were selected to the all-conference team as well.

"I feel like these guys are really unselfish and don’t really care who gets the stats, and I think that speaks a lot about their character," said Coach Hamel of the many awards they took home.

The Wildcats return to the scene of their conference championship victory Friday, Jan. 24 to take on the Liberty Academy Eagles.