After hitting a game-winning buzzer beater last winter, Will Davis knew he needed to answer the call when the Skyline Hawks came back for revenge a year later. Fresh off a 25-point outing against Kettle Run, he scored 24 on Friday night to lead the Meridian High School boys’ basketball team in a 67-53 victory over their bitter Northwestern District rivals.
The Meridian Mustangs entered the night 9-1, but their eleventh game of the 2025-26 season would be a chance for the campaign’s biggest signature win. As is always the case against Skyline, it was a full house in the Mustang gym, and the type of battle between the two regional heavyweights in which every possession needed to count.
Just as they were in each of the previous two seasons, Jim Smith’s boys were up to the task. Mason Pye had five early points and the Mustangs jumped out to a 13-8 lead after a frame, then went on a 6-0 run after Skyline knotted it up at 17. Davis started slow, but hit two massive threes in the final minute of the first half to extend Meridian’s advantage to ten at the break.
The Hawks climbed back within 40-34 in the third quarter, but Meridian continued to respond to every run with one of their own. The Mustangs were back ahead by 11 entering the fourth quarter and then reached their largest lead at 57-39 midway through the period after Davis knocked down a cold-blooded “No, no, no… yes!!!” transition three. Things got tense in the final moments as Skyline made one final push with their vicious full-court press, briefly returning within single digits, but the home team put it away at the free throw line to reach a final tally of all the kids’ favorite number.
For Meridian, it’s the type of culture-affirming win that speaks to how fortunate the Mustangs are to have a coach like Smith. You’d never know this is a team that lost four starters from last year’s group that went 27-1 and reached the Class 3 State Semifinals, but the longtime local legend has built a plug-and-play factory in Falls Church.
“After last year, I told all our returning players, ‘It’s your turn now,’” Smith said postgame. “Beating Skyline was a big part of what’s made our teams the past few years so special. So this was their turn to do something special.”
It all started with Davis, the lone returning starter, who certainly knows a thing or two about what it means to beat the Hawks.
“He played a very mature game,” Smith remarked of his star senior. “They had an All-State defender on him and he never panicked… he let the game to come to him.”
Marques Myles added 13 for Meridian and Pye had 12. Now at 10-1, the Mustangs will enjoy their long weekend before returning to action on Tuesday at Warren County.
