The Martin's Mill Mustangs celebrate their Class 2A Region II championship Saturday at McKinney Boyd High School.

MCKINNEY — With tears trickling down his face, Jake Bell hugged multiple friends and family following Saturday’s Class 2A Region II final.

The final embrace in the hallway outside of his team’s locker room was one packed with emotion. Bell’s father, Jeff — a longtime high school basketball coach with more than 800 wins and two state titles at Brock who now coaches at district rival North Hopkins — grabbed Jake and told him how proud he was of his son and his team.

Bell — in his fourth season as the head coach of the Martin’s Mill Mustangs — will get to be a head coach at the UIL State Basketball Tournament for the first time after his team took a 59-46 win over Big Sandy Saturday afternoon at Boyd High School.

“It means everything,” Bell said. “Our girls have been to the state tournament 13 of the past 14 years and the tradition there, that’s a lot to live up to on the boys side. The boys think about it, and we’ve talked about this since last year when we lost in overtime to Celeste.

“The goal was to get back to that game. I told them if we get back to the regional tournament, I would get us to a state tournament. They just had to believe. We had a game plan today, but the game plan is not successful if the boys don’t execute. They are the most coachable group I’ve been around.”

Martin’s Mill (36-4) is making its first trip to the state tournament since 2015 when it fell to state champion Canadian in the state semifinals.

The Mustangs reached the regional quarterfinals against Celeste again this season and took a 48-35 win to advance to the regional tournament. Martin’s Mill then defeated Poolville 42-25 to advance to Saturday’s final.

With one more victory needed to get back to the big stage, Martin’s Mill took a 13-11 lead at the end of the first quarter and led for all but 54 seconds the rest of the way.

The Mustangs play a six-man rotation. The one guy off the bench is senior Bryson Waynick, who came in less than two minutes into the contest to shoot a free throw when teammate Dylan Morrow was briefly hurt.

Waynick hit the 3-pointer at the buzzer at the end of the first quarter to give the Mustangs the lead.

Waynick also beat the buzzer with a backdoor layup at the end of the second quarter to put the Mustangs ahead 26-18 at the break, and Waynick went to the NBA 3-point range for a buzzer-beater to end the third quarter.

“He’s been a three-year starter for me, but he hurt his shoulder last year for the third time and had shoulder surgery,” Bell said. “His role is different this year, and he didn’t get a lot of minutes in some games, and that can be frustrating. Just a couple of weeks ago, we told him to stick to the process and that he’s going to have a big playoff game. And he did.”

“I just go in there glorifying God because he’s given me the ability to play,” Waynick said. “I’ve asked for a full season, and he’s given it to me, so I’m thankful. It’s an indescribable feeling, because we’ve worked for this since our freshman year, and now we have two games left. We’ve got to make it happen.”

Waynick said he’s had one surgery, four dislocations and a torn labrum during his high school career.

Waynick and teammate Garrett Celsur both scored 14 points. Morrow finished with 13 points.

Big Sandy was up 11-10 late in the first quarter after a triple by Caden Minter. Waynick’s buzzer-beater put the Mustangs in front 13-11.

Josiah Johnson had a putback with 4:54 left in the second quarter to tie the score at 15, but Celsur came back with a 3-pointer 54 seconds later to give the Mustangs the lead for good.

Martin’s Mill ended the half on an 11-3 run to lead 26-18.

Johnson had two fouls in the first four minutes of the game but didn’t pick up another until late in the third quarter. Johnson was fouled on a 3-pointer with 1:40 left in the third and made two of the attempts. He then picked up two more fouls in less than a minute to go to the bench with four fouls.

Martin’s Mill led 40-26 after three quarters.

Joshua Shipman hit two free throws and Johnson hit a jumper to cut the score to 40-30 early in the fourth quarter. But with 6:03 remaining, Johnson picked up his fifth foul.

Johnson finished with 12 points and five steals. He entered Saturday’s contest averaging 36.25 points per game in the playoffs and scored 40 points in Friday’s semifinal win over No. 2 Muenster.

Big Sandy cut the Martin’s Mill lead to seven late in the fourth quarter with a layup by Gabriel Lemons. The teams then traded a free throw each, and Lemons’ free throw with 1:09 left made the score 53-46. The Mustangs were able to add six more free throws in the final minute, and Big Sandy was unable to score again.

The Wildcats ended the season with a 30-5 record.

Shipman led Big Sandy with 14 points.

Martin’s Mill will compete in the Class 2A state tournament at 8:30 a.m. Friday against Gruver.

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Martin’s Mill 59, Big Sandy 46

Martin’s Mill 13 13 14 19 — 59

Big Sandy 11 7 8 20 — 46

MARTIN’S MILL — Logan Morrow 7, Dylan Morrow 13, Karson Godwin 8, Garrett Celsur 14, Michael Hawes 3, Bryson Waynick 14.

BIG SANDY — Caden Minter 3, Elijah Beard 8, Gabriel Lemons 9, Joshua Shipman 14, Josiah Johnson 12.