Mason County’s Jake Feldhause goes up for a dunk in the 39th district championship on Feb. 29, 2024.
The Bracken County Polar Bears are 2024 39th district runners-up.
The Mason County Royals are 39th district champs for the eighth consecutive year.
The Mason County Royals took to Bracken County to defend their district title against the Bracken County Polar Bears Thursday.
Starting off strong, Mason County flew past the Polar Bears putting up 26 points in the first quarter alone. Bracken County fought to hang on, but were down 26-8 heading into the second, and would need to leave everything they had on the court to catch back up to the surging Royals.
Many of Mason County’s points this quarter would come from one of their star three-point shooters, Braeden Myrick, who put up five threes in the first quarter.
“Braeden Myrick got us going there early in the game and his teammates were doing a good job of finding him in transition. He’s been shooting the ball with a lot of confidence lately, I think he was seven and nine tonight. We kinda got a little soft there in the second quarter, maybe gave up some easy things, but we made some adjustments there in the second half.” said Royals head coach, Brian Kirk.
Mason County’s offense slowed in the second quarter, allowing the Polar Bears to out score them 16-11. The Royals quickly got back on track in the second half however, and would continue to pull ahead of the Polar Bears .
Mason County put up 23 points in the third, out scoring Bracken by 13.
“Our kids just take pride in understanding that defense sparks our offense. When we get down and guard, keep people in front of us, make our opponent take tough twos, we’ve gotta keep them out of the paint, away from the rim. We did a much better job of that in the second half which led to some easy transition baskets.” said coach Kirk.
Putting up 23 more in the fourth quarter, Mason County led by 29 by the time the final buzzer sounded, taking home yet another 39th district championship.
“Some people underestimate these things, but they’re not easy to come by. You don’t get to compete for these every single year. Teams have gone years without getting one, so we’re not gonna underestimate this.” said coach Kirk.
Heading into next week, both the Royals and Polar Bears will be gearing up to compete in a challenging 10th region tournament bracket. Opponents like the George Rogers Clark Cardinals, Campbell County Camels and Harrison County Thoroughbreds are going to be tough match ups to take on for any team in the 10th region, as they each compete to advance to the region championship and the sweet 16.
“Gotta be excited. That’s six in a row since i’ve been here, eight in a row for our program. I’m just really proud of our kids. A lot of people counted us out a few weeks back. Said we wouldn’t win a district championship, said we wouldn’t be where we’re at right now, but our kids took that to heart, put an extra chip on their shoulders continued to battle, continued to compete and continued to get better every single day in practice. We’ve had a lot of guys step up, make big time plays and we’re excited to be representing the 39th district in the 10th region tournament at Mason County next week.” said coach Kirk.
ROYALS 83
POLAR BEARS 54
MASON COUNTY 16-11-23-23- 83
BRACKEN COUNTY 8-16-10-20- 54
Scoring
Mason- Feldhaus 14, Hamilton 17, Scilley 4, Myrick 25, McClannahan 8, Horch 4, Metts 4, Lang 2, Malone 2, Brookbank 3
Bracken- Archibald 12, Buchanan 8, Nelson 14, Feldhaus 5, Whitten 13, Bennedict 2
Game Stats
Field Goals: Mason 20, Bracken 17
3-Pointers; Mason 12, Bracken 4
Free Throws: Mason 7/12, Bracken 8/10
Fouls: Mason 15, Bracken 10
Records: Mason 20-11, Bracken 11-19
