SPORTS
Lady Rabbits fall in district opener to Holliday
The Bowie Lady Rabbits started district on Friday with their toughest game of the season taking on state-ranked Holliday.
The Lady Eagles won 71-15, showing why they are so highly ranked and one of the top teams in the area regardless of classification.
The Lady Rabbits came into the game knowing the challenge would tough.
Holliday was going to be a favorite to win the district title coming into this season with Nocona’s exit after three straight second place finishes. However, the Lady Eagles became state title contenders when the best player in the Wichita Falls area, Iowa State commit Jalynn Bristow, moved to the district from Rider for her senior year.
Bowie is not a tall team for 3A, but have made up for it with tenacity and physical play. However, that can sometimes only take you so far when a team is so outsized and the other team knows how to use it to its advantage.
It was clear to see from the opening tip how physically overmatched the Lady Rabbits were across the board, outsized at almost every position.
Bowie tried to limit Bristow, who is listed at 6 foot 3 inches, from getting the ball close around the basket by using a box-and-one defense, putting a defender in tight man coverage on her while everyone else is playing a 2-2 zone with an emphasis on trying to wall off the paint.
Lady Rabbit Coach Matthew Miller was fine letting Holliday shoot from the perimeter.
It was a good strategy as the Lady Eagles only made three 3-pointers in the game, but the lack of execution from Bowie meant its defensive strategy seemed to affect Holliday little.
The Lady Eagles scored however they wanted, mostly inside the 3-point arc, and despite the Lady Rabbits best efforts, got the ball to Bristow whenever they wanted and played off of that.
Holliday scored 21 points in the first two quarters to build a big lead, but that was mostly because Bowie could not buy a basket.
The Lady Eagles came out in a full-court trapping zone style to try and use their length to bother the Lady Rabbits from initiating offense. Bowie did a good job of not committing many turnovers getting the ball up the court to set up its half court offense.
In fact, some the Lady Rabbits most successful offense came from breaking the press and getting the ball to Kayleigh Crow ahead of the defense to finish at the rim. She led the team with six points.
Unfortunately, when set up in the half court is when the length seemed to bother Bowie players as passes were tipped or misjudged due to Holliday’s players being much bigger than what they are used to.
That height also seemed to dissuade drives to the basket as possessions seemed to end when someone decided they had enough room to chuck a 3-point shot in the hole of the zone. Unfortunately, only one went in all game for the Lady Rabbits from Ziba Robbins, who finished with the second most points on the team with five.
Despite the height differential, Bowie did not get abused rebounding the basketball on either side outside of a few sequences. To be honest Holliday did not miss that much so its chances to chase offensive rebounds were limited, but the Lady Rabbits battled well in that area outside of some balls that bounced right for only the tallest players on the court.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News.
The Nocona Indians wrapped up their first playoff berth since 2005 with a dominant win against Chico on Thursday at home.
The Indians won 10-0 in four and half innings due to run-rule to earn the district’s final playoff spot and break a nearly two decade drought.
Nocona was in a similar situation last year after beating Chico in the first game before losing twice more to the Dragons, once in the regular season finale and then in the play-in series.
The Indians won the first game earlier in the week 9-4, but knew they could play better. On Thursday they then proved it.
In the bottom of the first inning, Nocona got the scoring going as Wesley Murphey hit an RBI double. Two batters later, Landon Fatheree drove in two runs with a double.
Konnor Harrington followed with a groundout that scored another run as the Indians led 4-0.
In the second inning, Nocona kept up the pressure. Brody Langford drove in a run with a single. Later with the bases loaded, Caden Belcher was hit by a pitch that scored a run. A later passed ball allowed one more run to score as the Indians extended their lead to 7-0.
Nocona got one more run in the third inning. With the bases loaded, Wesley Murphey grounded into a fielder’s choice out that scored one run to make it 8-0.
The Indians got the final two runs they needed in the fourth inning. Walker Murphey and RJ Walker hit back-to-back RBI singles to put Nocona up 10-0.
Chico needed to score at least one run to prevent the game from ending early due to run-rule. Instead Walker Murphey completed the shutout performance by retiring the next three batters to end the game and the Dragon’s season.
The Indians won 10-0 and earned the district’s final playoff spot.
Wesley Murphey and Fatheree drove in two runs each to lead the team. Walker Murphey led the team with three hits. The team finished with 11 hits and drew six walks.
Walker Murphey also allowed zero runs and one hit while striking out five batters and walking none. The defense behind him committed only one fielding error.
Coach Zach Denson was beyond proud of this team for breaking the playoff drought.
“The amount of growth that they have shown throughout the year has been the most incredible I’ve seen in 13 years of coaching,” Denson said. “We went on a little skid in the middle of the year and that could have derailed our young team, but it actually brought us closer together as a unit.”
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News.
The Bowie Jackrabbits were able to clinch the final playoff spot on Thursday with a senior night home win against Henrietta.
The Jackrabbits won 6-1 in a game where all of the offensive action happened in the first three innings for both teams.
Bowie came into the game needing to win. Failing to do so would mean setting up a series with the Bearcats for the final playoff spot. If the Jackrabbits just took care of business against a team they had already beaten once pretty easily then they could avoid that whole situation.
Henrietta knew it was playing for the future of its season and struck first. A one out double followed by a single two batters later put the Bearcats up 1-0 against Bowie’s top pitcher Edmond De Leon on the mound.
The offense responded in the same inning with a two-out rally. Troy Kesey hit a single and Hayden Rodriguez drew a walk. De Leon then hit a double to drive one run in.
Cooper Hammer was then hit a by a pitch to load the bases up. Rayder Mann then drew a walk that scored one run and the Jackrabbits led 2-1 before the next batter popped up for out three.
Bowie added to that lead in the second inning. Boston Farris led off with a triple. Tucker Jones then hit a groundball to second base that resulted in an error that allowed Farris to score and make it 3-1 for the Jackrabbits.
Bowie then extended the lead in the third inning. Hammer hit a one-out single. Mann and Cy Egenbacher followed with hits that resulted in fielding errors for the Bearcats. The Jackrabbits scored one run on the second error.
Farris then hit a single that drove in another run. After a strikeout, a wild pitch then allowed another runner to score as Bowie was up 6-1. Another strikeout ended the scoring for the Jackrabbits.
The next three and half innings saw neither team score runs, though both had several chances with two runners getting on at times.
Henrietta’s best chance came in the fifth inning with two singles, but De Leon and Bowie’s defense shut that down. De Leon retired the final seven batters he faced as the Jackrabbits won 6-1.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News.
Last week all of the area schools competed in their district’s tennis tournament and several schools had athletes qualify for the regional tournament.
In the end, 10 athletes finished second or better at district to move on for a chance to qualify for state.
Unfortunately, no players from Bowie were able to break through and qualify.
Many faced early seeding opponents from tennis power Vernon that ended their tournament.
The highest finish for a Bowie player was Lily Hodges who placed fourth in girls singles.
From Nocona, one girl was able to break through as Kaygan Stone finished second in girls singles to qualify for regionals.
Stone has had a tough year, dealing with shoulder problems that shortened both her volleyball and basketball seasons, but she bounced back this spring to qualify for regionals in tennis.
Her teammate Melissa Segura was not so lucky, as she finished third in girls singles and just missed the cut, having to settle for an alternate spot
At the 1A tournament, several schools had multiple athletes in one division qualify.
From Saint Jo, last year’s state qualifying girl’s doubles team of Kyler Dunn and Taylor Patrick won the division.
They beat out the second place finisher and their teammates, the girl’s doubles team of Maxey Johnson and Bailey Nobile, who also qualified for regionals.
From Gold-Burg, Jimena Garcia and Alyson Rojas placed first and second in girls singles to move on to the regional tournament.
Other schools only had one team or individual.
From Forestburg, the mixed doubles team of Jesse Wadsworth and Alli Cisneros finished second as they qualified for regionals.
From Prairie Valley, Case Carpenter finished second in the boys singles division.
To read the full story and see pictures of all of the qualifiers, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News.
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