Vicksburg High coach Dellie C. Robinson has coached basketball for more than 30 years, long enough to know that earth-shaking upsets happen from time to time. He’s also enough of a realist to know that those are exceedingly rare, and a few dozen things have to break perfectly for them to happen.

Those two forces are coloring he and his Gators’ approach as they get set to host three-time defending Class 5A champion Callaway in the first round of the Division 4-5A Tournament on Tuesday.

The Gators would certainly like to beat Callaway, but don’t need to do it to advance to the Class 5A state tournament. They can do that by beating Lanier or Pearl in the third-place game on Friday. With that in mind, Robinson is favoring the realistic approach of playing the long game, most likely sacrificing a loss and hoping his team shakes off its doldrums in time to win the consolation game and a state tournament berth that could salvage a disappointing season.

“We’re definitely going to throw all our eggs into the Friday basket. No doubt about that,” Robinson said. “Hopefully we can come out and play hard against Callaway, but certainly we’re looking forward to playing that third-place game against Pearl or Lanier. We’re putting everything we’ve got into that game, and hopefully we can come out the victor in that game.”

Robinson’s resignation to Callaway’s dominance is understandable. The Chargers are 25-2 this season, and 84-10 over the last three. They’ve beaten Vicksburg seven times over the past two seasons, including in last year’s Class 5A championship game and by 22 and 36 points in two meetings this season.

Led by All-America senior guard Malik Newman, who is averaging 30.4 points per game, Callaway is the odds-on favorite to win its fourth straight state title — and the road starts in Vicksburg.

“When you play Callaway, you have to understand who you’re playing. You’re not playing a high school team. You’re playing an AAU team,” Robinson said. “We’re going to look over that game and get ready for the next one.”

Even though they might be playing for third place, winning that game will not be easy for the Gators (12-12). They have a .500 record, but went 0-6 in division play and are 2-9 overall since New Year’s.

Even more troubling is some internal team turmoil.

Five seniors, including starting forward Khris Walker and key reserve Justin Selvy, quit the team last week in a dispute over playing time. Five freshmen were called up to take their place, forcing Robinson to adjust his rotations and schemes on the fly. The first game with the new look lineup was a 71-37 loss to Brandon last Friday.

Robinson said he’ll need forward Kirk Parker, one of the team’s remaining key post players, to take on more of the load this week. Parker is averaging 9.8 points and 7.3 rebounds this season, but only scored six points in the loss to Brandon.

“We’ve got Kirk in the middle, and Kirk wasn’t making shots down inside (against Brandon),” Robinson said. “If Kirk makes shots down inside, we’ll be fine, but he’s going to have to score down there and right now he’s missing too many easy shots point-blank at the basket. If he makes some of those shots, we score some points and things will be a little bit different.”

Vicksburg’s girls’ team hasn’t had a mass defection of players like the boys, but is in the same position of trying to salvage a disappointing season.

The Missy Gators (10-15) have lost 11 straight games. They’re shooting 31 percent from the field and 43 percent from the free throw line as a team and averaging more than 17 turnovers per game.

They’ll also face Callaway (17-5) in the first round, after having lost 49-36 and 55-34 to the Lady Chargers this season.

Despite everything that seems to be going wrong, the Missy Gators still feel like they have a puncher’s chance of pulling an upset — just like they did last season when they knocked off No. 1 seed Lanier to advance out of the division tournament for the first time in seven seasons.

Vicksburg has a bonafide superstar with forward Karry Callahan (12.5 points, 16.2 rebounds, 4.6 assists, 3.5 steals and 2.2 blocks per game) and some capable secondary options like guards Keiyana Gaskin (9.9 points per game) and Ruddie Shears (10.5 points per game).

Some other role players have also stepped up from time to time. Guard Micha Williams, for example, scored a season-high 19 points in a loss to Greenville last week.

The challenge for the Missy Gators is getting everything to click together for just one night. They haven’t been able to do that in nearly two months and have seen a promising season slip away. Recapturing some magic, though, would make a lot of the disappointment melt away.

“It’s just if they show up or not. You’ve got to play as one, take care of the basketball and stop shooting ourselves in the foot. Turnovers are what’s beating us. It’s not the other team,” Missy Gators coach Barbara Hartzog said. “They believe they can beat Callaway, and that’s what we’re working toward. We’ve got to go in and pull out everything we’ve got left.”

Division 4-5A Tournament

At Vicksburg High

Tuesday

Girls

4 p.m. – Vicksburg vs. Callaway

7 p.m. – Lanier vs. Pearl

Boys

5:30 p.m. – Vicksburg vs. Callaway

8:30 p.m. – Lanier vs. Pearl