FLEMINGSBURG – One-point games and Mason County are a match made in heaven.
Or hell, considering the Royals outcomes in those contests.
At this point, one could wonder ‘here we go again’, the Royals 1-4 in the previous one-point outcomes.
The Royals found themselves in another one on Saturday, this time to Holmes in the Coach Lake Kelly Classic at Fleming County.
And once again, they came out on the losing end of a battle down to the final second.
Quantez Calloway’s jumper in the lane with less than five seconds to go got the Bulldogs a 50-49 victory, the Royals unable to get a shot off in the final seconds after.
It took a while for the Royals to get to that point however, plagued by a slow start and a 12-point first half deficit.
They’d dig themselves a 16-10 deficit after a quarter of play and 26-20 at the half.
“I thought we came out very flat. We dug ourselves a 12-point hole, were a bit careless with the basketball. Give credit to Holmes and the defensive intensity. They got up in us and we have to be able to handle that if we want to advance in postseason. That’s how postseason basketball is played, it gets a little more physical,” Kirk said.
They’d get within five in the third thanks to Mason Butler’s career-high 10 points, six of them coming in the frame.
“I thought Mason did a great job coming in, providing us a big spark and handling the basketball,” Kirk said.
But Holmes took a 38-30 lead into the fourth. Another spark came from Alex Schalch, scoring the final six points in a 8-0 Royals run to tie things up at 38.
Holmes maintained the lead after a Demario Foster 3-point play to make it 42-39, but back-to-back 3-pointers from Xylon Frey made it 45-42 Royals, their first lead since it was 1-0 to start the game.
Eian Elmer and Carson Brammer then traded 3-pointers, the Royals maintaining a 3-point lead at 48-45 with 1:08 to play.
Tayquan Calloway’s first two points of the game made it a one-point game, Xylon Frey hitting 1-of-2 from the stripe, Jamir Ruff also hitting 1-of-2 to make it 49-48 Royals.
Ruff’s second free throw was missed and was a big rebound, one the Bulldogs were able to secure and call timeout with 9.1 seconds left.
“If we secure the rebound on that missed free throw the game is different I believe,” Kirk said. “We also went 10-of-17 from the free throw line, every one-point loss we’ve had this year we’ve missed seven or more free throws in all of those games. We’ve got to be able to stay locked in, continue to focus when we go to the line whether it be the first three minutes of the game or the last three minutes.”
After a pair of timeouts from Holmes, Quantez Calloway drove down the middle of the Royals zone, pulled up in the paint and hit the go-ahead shot, finishing with 14 points and 10 rebounds on the day including the MVP award.
“It’s unfortunate, we’ve got to be able to come up with a defensive stop there and we win a ballgame. Defense is sometimes what it comes down to and we’ve got to get defensive stops,” Kirk said. “I feel confident in the way our kids have been playing. I knew whatever they were doing was going to be attacking the basket and felt like our best advantage to that was to show them a form of a zone and they made a great play, a great read on a ballscreen that got them downhill and attacking and their kid made a great play.”
The Royals, without timeouts, took it out of bounds quickly, but after two passes and a couple of dribbles, a shot did not get off in time, dropping them to 10-8 on the season, six of those losses by four points or less, another loss in overtime.
“We’ve just got to regroup and refocus. I think that the kids have become a little complacent. We’ve won some games and we’ve lost a lot of close games as well. The thing is we’re in every game we play. That’s a positive note, it’s tough when you get beat by 25-30, it’s tough when you get beat by one as well, but there’s a lot more things that you can be positive about in a one-point loss compared to a 30-point loss,” Kirk said.
Mason County might be a little shorthanded for the foreseeable future, Kolby Jones going down with an elbow injury in the first half and unable to return. Jones had scored 64 points the previous five games coming into Saturday’s contest.
The Royals return to action on Tuesday when they play at Paris.
BULLDOGS 50, ROYALS 49
HOLMES—16-10-12-12—50
MASON COUNTY—10-10-10-19—49
Scoring
Holmes (50) – Q. Calloway 14, Elmer 9, Abdullah 8, Foster 8, Ruff 7, Meyer 2, T. Calloway 2
Mason (49) – Schalch 18, Butler 10, Frey 9, Henry 7, Brammer 3, Jones 2
Game Stats
Field Goals: Holmes 20/48, Mason 17/41
3-Pointers: Holmes 1/7, Mason 5/10
Free Throws: Holmes 9/11, Mason 10/17
Rebounds: Holmes 30 (Q. Calloway 10), Mason 26 (Frey 5)
Turnovers: Holmes 13, Mason 16
Records: Holmes 8-12, Mason County 10-8
Leave a Reply