SPORTS
Nocona Indians win 60-38 in bi-district game
The Nocona Indians easily won their bi-district playoff game against Haskell on Monday night in Olney.
Nocona won 60-38, starting out hot and never looking back despite cooling off as the game went along.
Nocona came into the game as favorites after going through district undefeated for its second straight district title and ranked ninth in the state in 2A according to the most recent Texas Association of Basketball Coaches poll.
Haskell was a fourth seed who came into the game and both wanted to play fast but also tried to post up its big, but not tall, post players on the block.
With Nocona not having elite height or size on its roster, it was the biggest defensive concern.
Haskell came out with a full-court press and played in a 3-2 zone on defense, trying to pressure the ball and force the action since the team did not have great height at the rim either.
Nocona was able to handle the press with little trouble all night, with few turnovers coming from overwhelming pressure. The team early on made several 3-pointers, dicing up Haskell’s zone defense with sharp passes that created open looks.
Nocona led 12-2 after four minutes and Haskell was never able to make it any closer. Nocona continued on and extended the lead to 21-6 at the end of the first quarter as the team made five 3-pointers.
Nocona was playing straight man-to-man defense, but had players sagged off into the paint to try and prevent clean passes into the player or ready to rotate when passes did get through. Haskell was not able to make many 3-pointers on the night, finishing with only three, to make Nocona pay for sagging off its players off the ball on defense.
Haskell was able to get the ball inside enough and played with energy to grab offensive rebounds, especially early on, to score better in the final three quarters.
Nocona’s hot 3-point shooting cooled off as the team made only one more for the rest of the game. However, Nocona was still able to score a bit more points than Haskell almost every quarter by driving into the lane and hitting cutters at the basket for uncontested layups.
Nocona led 34-16 at halftime and 49-27 after three quarters before eventually winning 60-38.
To read the full story, 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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