Neer Double Dip

The Pioneer Varsity basketball team played a double header at the Joe tonight. It was the first such lineup for the teams this year. I really like the double dips and hope the teams can schedule more in the future. The fans who came out to Indy tonight saw two dandys as both teams of Neers played extremely hard. The boys battled a strong Henry Clay team and lost on a bad call at the buzzer by a final of 53 to 51. The girls broke their 4 game losing streak by upsetting the Conner Cougars in a flat out battle.  

Boys Game- SK struggled early on to hit shots. It almost looked at first like they didn’t have their legs as they missed shot after shot. Part of the missed shots were caused by Henry Clay closeouts and block attempts but the boys just didn’t seem to hit shots they usually connect. Senior Cody Chambers would start heating up in the second quarter as he stymied the Devil runs. SK would trail at half-time by 8 points but it was one of those games where it felt like the lead could have been a lot more.

The Neers came out in the third quarter and didn’t seem to have an answer for Clay. The Neers fell behind by 15 points and looked like they were ready to be blown out of the Joe. SK trailed by 13 at the end of the third.

The Neers would get the lead down to about 10 with just over 4 minutes to go. The Devils decided at that point to take some time off the clock. With the stall in place, the Neers got feisty on defense. SK was getting stops and converting and suddenly you got that feeling things were going their way. Henry Clay got complacent but the Neer boys kept clawing and scratching. On the offensive end, the ball went to Chambers and he was sticking it in the basket both off nice drives to the cup and several treys. SK got possession down 3 points. They connected on the first foul shot but missed the second. SK challenged for the rebound and the deflection bounced off the Devil player. With the ball out of bounds under the basket, everyone knew the play would have gone to Chambers; it didn’t. Andrew Sampson got the ball, took a short drive and pulled up for a 10 foot jumper that was good and tied the score at about 5 seconds. Clay didn’t call timeout, made two passes up the floor and got off a wide open lay-up. Only problem the pictures and videos circulating on camera phones sure made it seem like the Devils got a break. I didn’t think the shot was good but the problem was the crowd was so loud from the Sampson bucket that it was hard to hear the horn. The refs kind of looked at each other like, “did anyone see that?” One of them signaled good and they ran off the floor without even a discussion. Too bad. The boys played hard and never quit. Check out the videos and see what you think?

Henry Clay 13…15…16…9=53
Simon Kenton 7…13…11…20= 51 

Henry Clay (17-6) -- Kimball 10, Green 10, Cunningham 9, Setzer 8, Tisdale 6, Grundy 5, Blackburn 4, Tichenor 1. 
Simon Kenton (15-7) -- Chambers 23, Ayers 10, Sampson 9, Barnes 5, Mullen 4.







Chambers was nails tonight.


Sampson's game tying shot.

The girls team came into the game riding a 4 game losing skid and with the 7^th ranked team in Northern Kentucky was sporting an impressive 18-4 record.  The girls had been falling behind early in their last several games.  Tonight was no different as the girls had trouble scoring.  As the game progressed, the tone was set; ugly.  The game was about as scrappy as a game can get.  Both teams got after lose balls and challenged on D.  However, it was SK who played just a little bit harder than the Cougars.  The game was probably the girls’ most physical effort since the Lex Cath tourney.  They took charges, dove on the floor, tackled at times, and gave it all they had all night long.  An early deficit was erased as the girls took a 4 point half-time lead. 

The girls came out in the third quarter and the Neers caught fire, especially from outside as they stretched the lead out to 15.  Abby Owings was connecting from 25 feet while Hannah Stephenson was scoring from just about everywhere.  Stephenson would score 27 and Owings 22.  The girls definitely gave one of their hardest efforts on the season as the  losing streak comes to an end.  Definitely an effort the girls will want to bottle and save.

Owings broke things open against Conner.

Sara gets tagged on the knoggin driving to the hoop.