The middle school Cougar basketball teams took two wins on Monday as they played host to the visiting Hancock County Hornets at Cougar Gym.
In the opener, Taydon Logsdon scored 16 points and Mason Cariel added 11 as the seventh-grade Cougars won easily, 45-31. In a close game from start to finish, the eighth-grade Cougars won 38-37 on a rebound basket by Dillon Horn with four seconds left to play.
SEVENTH-GRADE GAME
The Cougars never trailed in this game after scoring the game’s first five points. They led 9-3 after the first period of play.
The Cougars then opened the second period with a 9-2 run to build a 13-point lead, 18-5 with 1:50 left in the first half. They still led by 13, 20-7 at the halftime intermission.
A three-pointer by Hancock’s Brady Atwell at the 3:00 mark of the third period brought the visitors to within seven points of the lead, 22-15, but the Cougars closed out the period on an 11-4 run to increase their lead to 14 points, 33-19 heading into the final period of play. The Hornets were never closer than 11 points the rest of the way.
Logsdon also led the team on the boards with seven rebounds and he added three steals. Cariel added four boards and also had three steals.
Three players, Jeren VanMeter, Landon Haycraft, and Isaiah Poteet each scored four points, while Houston Brooks, Dawson Childress and Grayson Chaffins all scored two points to complete the scoring.
EIGHTH-GRADE GAME
In a game with four lead changes and nine ties, neither team led by more than four points.
There were four ties in the first period, but Hancock’s Luke Brown banked in a three-pointer as time expired to give the Hornets their largest lead of the game, 16-12 as the teams began the second period.
Still trailing by four, 18-14 at the 5:25 mark, the Cougars reeled off eight unanswered points to take their largest lead of the night, four points at 22-18 with 1:38 left in the first half. The Cougars led by just two points, 22-20 at the half.
Neither team could press an advantage in the third quarter, which ended with the Cougars still clinging to their two-point lead, 30-28.
The Hornets tied the game one last time at the start of the fourth quarter on a Jack Duncan lay-in at the 5:12 mark. Baskets by Nolan Hornbeck and Jerron Salazar gave the Cougars another four-point lead, 34-30 with 2:33 left to play.
An old-fashioned three-point play by Brown with 38 seconds left to play brought the Hornets to within a point, 36-35. Hancock called a timeout, and on the ensuing inbounds play, the Cougars threw the ball away, then committed a foul.
Cole Dixon went to the line for two free throws with 33 seconds left and hit both to put the Hornets on top 37-36.
The Cougars called a timeout with 26.4 seconds left to try to set up a winning basket. As time wound down, the Cougars were desperately trying to get that winning shot under the basket. A shot went up that went over the basket, where Horn was waiting for the rebound. He waited for a defender to clear, then went up and put the ball off the glass and into the net with 4.7 seconds left.
The Hornets were then unable to get the ball up the floor and the Cougars went into celebration mode.
Dixon led all scorers with 17 points. Hornbeck led the Cougars with 14 points and he added six rebounds and two steals. Braydon Childress scored nine points and added four rebounds and two steals.
River Blanton had six points, led the team on the boards with eight rebounds, and led the team with three steals. Jerron Salazar came off the bench to add five points, while Horn finished with four points and seven rebounds.
By Don Brown, Local Sports
Reach Don at donbrown@k105.com
