Shane Sayegh is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Mountain View High School for AZPreps365.com

The Mountain View High School boys basketball team is establishing itself as a presence in the 6A conference to be reckoned with.

The Toros have a 14-3 record and are undefeated in 6A East Valley play at 9-0, while being 13-3 in conference play. The record is an improvement from last season’s mark of 12-6.

Mountain View clinched its first 6A East Valley title since 2019, a feat that was previously held by Mesa High School, which is less than 10 minutes from Mountain View. This moment was regarded as their best so far by coach Andy Johnson.

“We had a lot of great moments, last night winning the district championship on your rival in your rival’s house, there's not much better than that,'' Johnson said. "That was a lot of fun."

Winning the 6A East Valley title at Mesa was fueled by the feelings of fierce rival competition, described by seniors Brigg Wolfe and Jay Tingey.

“It's insane, you don't get tired ever,'' Wolfe said. "You can't really feel anything, just those butterflies never go away and just always energy. It's awesome."

“We walked out last night and they started booing us, it's probably the best moment of the season,'' Tingey said. "It's the best feeling if you go in and you know you're going to work harder than they are and you're going to try your hardest and you came out with a win."

Aside from winning, Johnson and the Toros hope to instill values that will remain throughout the team’s journey through life, on the court or off.

“With our program, we wanted our guys to work hard every single day, we want them to have a positive attitude and want them to be great teammates, and they've done all three of those above and beyond,” Johnson said.

For many Mountain View players, the work ethic has helped them flourish throughout this season. Wolfe has seen the results.

“I've never worked this hard in my life,'' he said. "We came out here in the summer, we were on the football field every day. Just that hard work and just watching it pay off has been awesome."

With the hard work and good attitude, the Toros continue down the right path to keep getting better and improve every aspect of their game both on offense and defense.

“We're still trying to look to get a little bit better every single day,'' Johnson said. "That's our goal, to try to get better every single day.”

As for the nine seniors on the Toros roster, this season has been one to remember. Tingey said he felt his senior season was a year of improvement and cementing their presence in the record books.

"I've been here for so long and it's been a season where we try to get far, do better than the year we had last year and try to get some records for this team,” Tingey said.

The last game of the regular season for the Mountain View Toros is Friday night. They host Red Mountain at 7 p.m.