SPORTS
Lady Indians going to state
After years of local domination, the Nocona Lady Indians are finally going to the basketball state tournament this week after winning the 2A region II title on Saturday at McKinney North.
The Lady Indians got redemption, beating Lipan 50-41, the defending state champions who beat Nocona last year in the same game. The Lady Indians also beat Muenster the day before 58-43.
Nocona came into the tournament feeling confident, but knew it was not going to be easy. Last year the team played Muenster twice and both games were low-scoring and competitive with the Lady Indians winning by only four and five points.
The first quarter of last year’s game in the regional tournament infamously ended with Nocona leading 1-0.
The Lady Hornets had a similar record and ranking heading into the semifinal game this year, with 29 wins and ranked 16th in the state in 2A according to the Texas Association of Basketball Coaches poll and 12th according to Max Preps.
Nocona knew it was going to be tough despite being favorites to win again against a Muenster team that was seeking redemption for last year.
The Lady Hornets played a deliberate and patient offensive game, with much off-ball movement coming off of screens. Nocona opted to play man-to-man defense, so players had to navigate the many screens for sometimes a full minute. Many Lady Indians even took to barreling through some screens to try and keep attached to players.
Muenster played a similar style of defense, with nothing fancy except straight up man-to-man.
The first quarter was a little slow, but nothing compared to last year’s slugfest as Nocona led 8-7.
“Their urgency and defense makes it tough,” Coach Kyle Spitzer said. “When we are on offense it just seems like it is so hard to score sometimes.”
The biggest thing to happen was the Lady Indians Skyler Smith got into foul trouble, picking up two fouls in the final minute which pushed her to the bench.
Muenster found its most successful offense hunting matchups for big, but not tall, player Anna Kay Hennigan who used her size and skill to score on drives to the basket. With Smith out, Nocona was more vulnerable to these disadvantage matchups.
Luckily, the Lady Indians still had their leading scorer Meg Meekins to lead them and the Lady Hornets had no answer. Meekins had scored six points in the first quarter and then scored 10 in the second quarter.
This helped cover as Smith had to go back to the bench midway through the quarter as she picked up her third foul.
Nocona led 25-17 at halftime.
For most of the third quarter the Lady Indians had trouble scoring after two quick baskets in the first two minutes. Muenster was hanging around and Nocona got more bad news when Smith picked up her fourth foul with three minutes left to play in the quarter.
With the Lady Hornets trailing by six points they were hoping they could change the momentum of the game.
Again, there was too much Meekins for Muenster to handle. She scored eight of her team’s 15 points in the quarter and helped spark a 10-6 run to end quarter. Nocona led by double-digits heading into the fourth quarter, up 40-30.
Give the Lady Indians a lead in the final period and it has been death for opponents.
While it almost back fired in their previous game against Cisco, the scaling back of Nocona’s offense to run some clock with good free throw shooters and ball handlers on the court has made it hard for opponents to come back against the Lady Indians.
Still, the Lady Hornets gave it their best shot. Muenster went on a 10-2 run in about a two minute sequence to cut the lead down to 49-43 with 2:14 left to play.
Smith came back in and she made up for her time sitting as she was sent to the free throw line four times.
She sunk all eight of her attempts to help Nocona pull away for good as the Lady Hornets offense ran out of gas. Aubree Kleinhans added one more free throw to give the Lady Indians their final point as Nocona won by the comfortable margin 58-43.
To read the full story that includes the recap against Lipan in the regional final, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News.
Two former Bowie boy’s golf members played in the PGA University Championship on Nov. 12-13. (L-R) Cy Egenbacher and Imanol Walker are both in the Sam Houston University PGA Golf Managerment program. The team finished 16th overall. Egenbacher shot 168 during the two rounds and finished tied for 67th. Walker shot 180 and finished 84th. The tournament is a fun one for univesities that have PGA Golf Management programs, which is for individuals who want to work in the golf industry after graduation.
The Saint Jo Lady Panthers came up short at the regional final for the third straight season, one game away from state, on Saturday at the regional tournament in Midlothian.
The Lady Panthers beat Evant in straight sets 3-0 on Friday to reach the final game against Harrold which they lost 3-0.
Saint Jo knew before the season even started it would likely come to this big challenge, but it still had to go through all the steps to get there.
The Panthers reached the regional finals the previous two seasons, losing both times to eventual state champion Blum.
With district realignment meant a new region so a rematch with a Blum program that had graduated several key players from those teams would have to wait until state possibly.
Instead, a showdown against last year’s state runner-up Harrold was forecast in the regional final.
With the team having six seniors, with five of them having been on varsity since they were freshman, it was this year or bust for Saint Jo.
First, the Lady Panthers had to beat Evant. The Lady Elks leaned heavily on a big front court player. When she rotated to the back row, Evant showed almost no net resistance which meant Saint Jo hitters had free reign during that time.
The Lady Panthers won each set pretty easily, with the scores being 25-17, 25-17 and 25-19.
This set up the match with Harrold the team had been anticipating. The Lady Hornets had been at or near the top of the state standings since the beginning of the season.
Harrold had so much respect it had even played bigger local schools this season, beating Bowie in straight sets and Nocona in five sets during its pre-district schedule.
The two teams had met earlier in the season when the Lady Hornets attended Saint Jo’s hosted tournament. The two teams met in the tournament championship where Harrold won 2-1.
Still, with the tournament format being a best of three instead of five and the match after playing an exhausting schedule of five matches the previous two days, that result was not gospel, especially two months later.
The challenge is Harrold had multiple big hitters at the net, which is a big deal since most 1A teams are lucky to have one or two, which meant constant pressure on Saint Jo’s defense.
This also meant the Lady Panthers constantly had to find ways to attack the Lady Hornet defense as well or it would face strong hit after strong hit which was unsustainable for any team.
The first set saw the Lady Hornets get out to a good start before the Lady Panthers rallied back and took a little lead 8-7. Unfortunately, it started turn from there.
Harrold had some good runs from the service line that Saint Jo struggled to make much offense out of and led to the Lady Hornets pulling away. Harrold won 4-1 to get the lead to 11-9 and then extended it to 14-11, 17-13. Another 4-1 run and the Lady Hornets could smell the end of the first set coming.
The Lady Hornets won 25-17 to take the lead 1-0.
Saint Jo needed to bounce back, but unfortunately never got anything going in set two.
Harrold led 4-1 and then 8-2. The Lady Panthers would have needed a huge run at some point from the service line to get back into the set, but it never came as the Lady Hornets lead grew more and more.
Harrold took set two 25-13 to go up 2-0 and had all of the momentum.
Saint Jo had its back against the wall, knowing the only option was to hope for a comeback that would lead to a fifth set, but to get there it needed to win set three.
The Lady Panthers initially started on the right foot. After falling being 4-1 to start the previous two sets, it was Saint Jo that started well up 4-1. Unfortunately, the Lady Hornets came roaring back, going on an 8-2 run as it led 9-6, then 12-8 and 15-10.
It looked like it was heading towards a similar place as set one with Harrold slowly running away with the set before the Lady Panthers made one last gasp.
Saint Jo eventually cut the lead down to one point, trailing 20-19 as the set entered the final stretch and the Lady Panthers had their best momentum of the match.
Unfortunately, it was Harrold that was able to close the set out with momentum, earning the final five points to win 25-19 and the match 3-0.
To read the full story, pick up a copy of the mid-week edition of the Bowie News. For pictures from Friday’s match, click here https://www.dotphoto.com/go.asp?l=bnews1&AID=6870620&T=1
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