All season long the Lexington basketball team believed in itself, even when others didn’t. The Wildcats defied the odds and marched through the upper state playoffs all the way to Carolina Coliseum and the Class AAAA state championship game to face Lower Richland, a team that had been penciled in to be playing on March 12 since the season began.

“We’re not supposed to be here,’’ Lexington coach Bailey Harris said after Friday’s state championship game. “We didn’t even win our region, and at Christmas we’re sitting at 6-4, looking like we’re going nowhere. I don't think too many people thought we were going to be around for the playoffs.’’

But that’s when the Wildcats began playing the type of basketball that carried Lexington to its third state championship game in the past four seasons.

“We started playing extremely well in January, and we’re playing our best basketball at the end of the season,’’ Harris said. “It’s hard to put a finger on it. The guys seemed to identify their roles, the effort picked up and the intensity level obviously picked up. We identified what we needed to do for us to win. It seemed like all year long, our ability to maintain our composure in rough spots was the defining theme for this team.’’

Lexington didn’t have too many rough spots from that point forward, as the Wildcats went 16-4 to finish the season 22-8. The Wildcats suffered just three losses in Region 3-AAAA, all of which were avenged. Lexington dropped its first game to arch-rival Irmo and lost both regular season games to region champion North Augusta, which went unbeaten through the conference.

But Lexington defeated Irmo 46-35 during the last week of the regular season to clinch second place in the region and earn a first-round bye in the playoffs.

The Wildcats defeated Westside in the second round and Hillcrest in the third round to advance to the upper state championship against heavily-favored North Augusta. Lexington then accomplished the unthinkable, pounding North Augusta 59-45 to reach the state final.

“I don’t know if we’ve ever gotten more out of a team, including the team that won a state championship. That team had a lot of talent. Every kid in that starting lineup on that team was a college basketball player,’’ Harris said, referring to the 1996 state championship team. “This team is probably not that caliber, and yet they lose by 10 points to the 20th-ranked team in the country. I can honestly say in my 12 years, this group’s gotten more out of their abilities than any team I’ve ever had.’’