Nocona vs Saint Jo boys
The Nocona Indians opened their season at Saint Jo on Friday night.
The experienced 2A Indians put it to the younger Panthers 78-41 in a game that showed the value of early season experience.
The two programs played to open last year’s season and a senior filled Saint Jo team hung with the bigger program Nocona for the whole game and only lost 53-46. It is a different situation heading into this season.
The Indians return five seniors from the team that won the program’s first district title since 1988, several with varsity experience dating back to their freshman year.
The Panthers returned only two players with varsity experience and only one started last year.
The start of the game was more competitive than the final score would indicate.
Nocona led 19-12 after the first quarter, but started to pull away in the second quarter.
The Indians’ experience and physicality became too much as their lead grew bigger and bigger as the game wore on.
In the end, Nocona won 78-41.
Johnny Stone scored a career high 21 points to lead the Indians. Javier Gaytan was second with 11 points while Karson Kleinhans scored 10 points off the bench. Conley Kleinhans grabbed a team high eight rebounds while Brady McCasland dished out seven assists.
For Saint Jo, Barrett Johnson led the team with nine points while Devin Stewart scored seven points.

Saint Jo girls
The Saint Jo Lady Panthers lost their opening game of the season on Friday against 2A Lindsay.
The Lady Panthers lost the physical game 52-31 against the bigger Lady Knights.
Saint Jo is hoping to build off its success from last year, finishing second in the district and winning its bi-district playoff game after several years of a playoff drought.
The Lady Panthers play at a frenetic pace and was successful in turning it into the type of game they like to play, forcing Lindsay into several turnovers and playing faster than it would want.
Unfortunately, with it being the first game while playing against taller players who were up for the challenge of playing just as physical as Saint Jo meant the Lady Panthers shooting and offense were not up to snuff.
The Lady Knights led from the beginning and the lead just kept growing the longer the game went on.
Fouls aplenty were called on both sides which meant several Saint Jo players had to sit for long periods of time due to foul trouble. It also meant a ton of free throw attempts.
Lindsay attempted 27 free throws and the Lady Panthers attempted 18. Many shots Saint Jo tried around the basket were blocked away by the taller and longer Lady Knight post players.
Kyler Dunn led the team with seven points while Jordyn O’Neal was second with six points.

Nocona girls
The Nocona Lady Indians won a low-scoring game, for them, at Graham on Friday afternoon.
The Lady Indians won easily 57-33 against the Lady Blues where the team was missing one of their starters.
Nocona was without post player Avery Crutsinger, but made up for it with tenacity.
In the Lady Indians opening game against City View, Coach Kyle Spitzer criticized his usually solid defense, but he chalked it up to being the first game of the season. Despite that, the team still won easily by shooting well.
On Friday, the team did not shoot its best. Only Skyler Smith, recently signed to East Texas Baptist University earlier in the week, had a great offensive day.
She scored 28 points and grabbed 11 rebounds to lead the team in both categories. She was the only Nocona player to finish in double figures.

To read the full story, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News.