HIGH SCHOOL BASKETBALL
The first 12 minutes dug Mason County too big of a hole to get out of Friday night at The Fieldhouse.
Trailing by as much as 18 in the first half, the Lady Royals cut the deficit to seven by half, but it was too much to ask against a Rowan County team, the Vikings coming away with a 55-44 victory.
The Lady Royals couldn’t do much right that earned them a 26-8 deficit, committing 15 turnovers in the first 12 minutes.
“At some point it is going to have to set in not to commit live ball turnovers. We throw passes uphill, away from the rim that doesn’t matter if it’s open or not. Like we need to get it uphill really, really fast, that pass gets stolen and it’s two points the other way, there’s nothing we can do about it,” Lady Royals coach Kevin Bundy said. “We like to consider ourselves a good defensive team, but when you have live ball turnovers you can’t guard that. That’s what happened early.”
But shots started to fall, turnovers minimized and suddenly it was a 30-23 game by the half.
“Better spacing, playing downhill and playing with our eyes up,” Bundy said of the improved play. “It’s a 3-2 zone extended out a little bit, but we stared at every pass and threw passes that gain us nothing like it’s got to get there right away rather than use your dribble, have a better angle and play downhill. Once we settled into the game we started doing that and then we go on our own 15-4 run.”
Another lull hurt the Lady Royals to open the second half, a 5-0 Rowan spurt to get their lead back to double-digits and taking a 44-32 lead into the fourth. Rowan County extended their pressure to keep their advantage.
“We came out in a press after half, we’re a pressing team, really didn’t too much in the first half tonight. Last few games in the third quarter we got off to slow starts so we wanted to get into our press, got three steals in a row right out of that press and that kind of opened things up for us and we were able to hold on,” Stokes said.
Avery Sims and Nariyah Harrison got baskets to cut the Lady Royals lead to eight in the fourth, but junior Division I prospect Haven Ford was able to milk the clock in the closing minutes, scoring the Vikings final seven points to preserve the victory.
“Smart kid. I didn’t call out anything the last two minutes of the game and when you have someone like that you trust them to get girls into position. Hailey Rose a senior who really stepped up as well. She came out firing tonight and was big in that start,” Vikings coach Matt Stokes said.
Ford ended with 22 points and 10 rebounds, both game highs. Rose chipped in 11 as the Vikings improved to 5-2 on the season.
Mason County was paced by Avery Sims, her activity on the glass earning her 10 points to go with eight rebounds, her second time this season scoring in double figures.
“Avery is a work in progress, but I tell you what she does everyday is show up and plays really hard. Her best basketball is in front of her, she’s going to keep getting better,” Bundy said.
Hannah Adkins provided nine points off the bench, all from the 3-point line in hitting three triples. Allison Gibbs added eight points.
The 27 turnovers were the story for the Lady Royals as those woes continue to plague them, regardless of wins or losses.
The wins or losses is something Bundy isn’t focused on yet with his team, rather more worried about other facets of the game first.
“I think people here measure everything in wins and losses and in my eyes that’s not how you measure success. We’re going to be challenged at times, I don’t have anybody that is going to jump out and take over the game like No. 22 (Ford) for them can do. There’s going to be lulls where we can’t score. It’s hard for us to score inside, we don’t have a dominant post player. We don’t have a whole lot of length, it’s not like we’re long and can slide into the rim and score runners. We have to rely on good execution and taking a good shot and hoping the shot goes in,” Bundy said. “So there’s going to be times it doesn’t look good. What I was really proud of is the way we kept playing hard and kept trying to do what we were asked to do. We executed better in the fourth quarter of this game than we have the entire season.”
They’ll return to action quickly on Saturday morning, playing at Bracken County in the St. Elizabeth Sports Med 9/10 Challenge taking on Newport Central Catholic.
“We play a well coached team from northern Kentucky tomorrow. They’re going to make everything we do difficult. We’re going to have to have enough discipline to play through the difficulty and still try to make the right play for us.”
The two combined for 49 turnovers in the contest.
“That quick start for us kind of really set the tone. They did a good job of getting back into it, we were throwing the ball away, they start throwing the ball away. It was a sloppy high school basketball game.”
VIKINGS 55, LADY ROYALS 44
ROWAN COUNTY – 21-9-14-11 — 55
MASON COUNTY – 8-15-9-12 — 44
Scoring
Rowan (55) – Ford 22, Rose 13, Lewis 6, Chandler 5, Utterback 5, Rogers 4
Mason (44) – Sims 10, Adkins 9, Gibbs 8, Thomas 5, Harrison 4, Payne 4, Littleton 3, Howard 1
Game Stats
3-Pointers made: Rowan 4, Mason 8
Free Throws: Rowan 11/18, Mason 8/12
Rebounds: Rowan 29 (Ford 10), Mason 27 (Sims 10)
Turnovers: Rowan 22, Mason 27
Personal Fouls: Rowan 10, Mason 12
Records: Rowan County 5-2, Mason County 5-3
