The play to get Newport to Rupp Arena and win a Ninth Region title was originally set up for their lone senior Marquez Miller.
But when things broke down, Jabari Covington needed to make a play and he delivered. The junior guard’s fadeaway mid-range jumper with 2.3 seconds remaining gave Newport a 44-42 victory over Cooper in the Ninth Region Championship.
The Wildcats are headed to the state tournament for the first time since 2010.
Things have built up to this moment for the Wildcats. They’re a young team with one senior, a junior, sophomore and two freshman in the starting lineup. Their top reserve is a sophomore.
“We don’t even tell them that. Haven’t talked about it all year. Talking to my coaches we talk about how we’re doing this with two freshman, a sophomore, junior and one senior and our subs are sophomores or younger. It went through my mind of how they’re going to adjust to a Ninth Region championship. I thought they were fantastic and up for the challenge,” Wildcats coach Rod Snapp said.
Maybe they don’t realize what they’ve done for how young they are. Covington, coming in from Ohio after attending Cincinnati College Prep Academy last year, didn’t really even know how the postseason worked headed into March.
“It’s all still going through my head right now,” Covington said.
But one thing the youth on the team does know, is how to win at a high level. Taylen Kinney and James Turner have done it on the AAU circuit, two highly regarded freshman in the state. The senior Miller bought into his role as the year went on, knowing he’d have to sacrifice some shots and spotlight to get the team where they needed to be.
“This feels great. I’m unselfish. Love seeing all these guys do their thing,” Miller said. “No one expected this from us. We just keep our head down in the gym and do what we need to do.”
Then there’s sophomores DaShawn Anderson and Noah Silverton, who bought into their roles as defensive minded guys and getting points when opportunities came.
They all grew up quickly as the year went on. After a 2-2 start, losses to Bishop Brossart and Campbell County, they won seven in a row when Covington became eligible on Dec. 10. They won at Highlands in the regular season for the first time in a long time, did it again in the 36th District Championship. A last second shot by Holy Cross’ Jacob Meyer dashed their hopes in the Ninth Region All “A” championship game, denying their bid to Richmond.
A double-overtime loss to Conner followed by a loss to Beechwood on Jan. 25, a team they had beat by 31 fifteen days prior and then things really started to click.
They learned from their losses and won 12 in a row from that point, one of those oddly enough including a 44-42 victory over Cooper on Feb. 9. Twenty-six days later, the Wildcats won by the same score, the stakes much higher as they’ll now head to Lexington.
“I’ve never been to Lexington,” Miller joked.
Now Miller will get that chance to head down to horse country with his Wildcat teammates. They’re headed down because of their willingness to sit down and guard and continue to attack the paint.
Newport shot 19-of-32 at Truist Arena on Tuesday night, committing just five turnovers against a Cooper team that doesn’t allow a termite to get through. The game was tight throughout, as many expected, Cooper’s 14-8 first quarter lead the largest of the game.
No one led by more than four in the second half.
The Jaguars got their fast start thanks to Yamil Rondon, scoring 12 first quarter points as the Jaguars built a 14-10 lead after a quarter of play.
“He keeps growing up. He has come so far in the last two to three months in the way he’s grown as a man. Off the court growing up and then on the court starting to learn how to try to be a leader in different ways. We know how talented he is and how skilled he is with the ball. He knows when he makes mistakes and takes responsibility. He didn’t used to be that way so it’s really fun seeing him grow up,” Jaguars coach Tim Sullivan said.
Then Miller was put on him, holding Rondon to four points the rest of the night. Miller himself went 7-for-7 from the field, finishing with a team-high 16 points.
After a Nmandi Ajaezu triple gave the Jaguars a 17-12 lead, Newport went on a 9-0 run over the next four-plus minutes, eventually taking a 21-19 lead into the half.
Then each possession was magnified in the second half. The two traded baskets for a while with a couple ties and lead changes, Newport eventually taking a 34-32 lead into the fourth.
For every Newport bucket, Cooper responded. Even at 42-38 with under two minutes to play, Sullivan felt good about things. With all they had gone through this season with losing Caleb Brooks and Shaun Pouncy to season-ending injuries, he knew his resilient bunch had one more run in them.
“I just think about where we’ve come until now. Just kind of a microcosm of it. We got down four and everybody in that arena kind of thought, oh boy, and just a testament to our kids and the way that we had been all year, just kept fighting. And you know, we had a chance. They’re really good,” Sullivan said.
And they did.
Gavin Lutz hit a pair of free throws, a Newport turnover followed and Lutz hit two more, tying the game up at 42 with 1:04 to play.
The Wildcats then sat on it for the next 52 seconds, calling time with 12 seconds to play.
They drew things up, initially trying to hit Miller in the post, but Covington saw an opening, attacked to the free throw line, spun to his left and hit a fadeaway that bounced on the front of the rim, off the backboard and down the bottom of the net, sending the raucous Wildcat contingent in a frenzy.
“I thought for sure it was going in, but I didn’t think I was gonna get the bounce like that,” Covington said.
Initially with just 0.3 seconds on the clock when Cooper was granted a timeout, officials discussed and decided to put 2.5 seconds on.
The Jaguars threw a pass to midcourt where another timeout followed, giving them a better angle and less distance to set something up.
Rondon caught the ball from about 35-feet, put up a desperation heave, but caught backboard and no iron, the Newport celebration was on.
“These kids work extremely hard. They’re very outgoing, they go to all the games. They don’t think they’re bigger or better than anybody and people get behind them. Look at this crowd tonight,” Snapp said.
They’ll now head to Rupp Arena to face a Lyon County team that will have plenty of fanfare behind them, with junior Travis Perry 21 points shy of breaking the KHSAA all-time scoring record in the matchup. The game will take place March 16 at 1:30 p.m.
Cooper’s season comes to a close at 18-13, but not before they showed their grit and determination to get to this point. The team rallied around after Pouncy’s injury in the quarterfinals, battling back to defeat Highlands in overtime. They then upset Covington Catholic to get to the finals before falling a possession short on Tuesday night.
“It came down to one play. You don’t win or lose on that play. Thought Andy (Johnson) did a phenomenal job just staying in front and he shoots a fadeaway jumpshot that just goes in,” Sullivan said. “Watching these kids grow up on that stage. We just talked in there in the locker room how these are the greatest years of your life. And when we talk to our alumni and the guys that are playing in power five conferences, yeah they’re enjoying that, they’re having fun and playing, but they still talk about playing high school basketball for Cooper. And those seniors are part of a fraternity now that is that is stronger than a lot of things. I’m just so proud of them. I mean, we were right there. They made one more play than we did.”
COOPER — 14-5-13-10 — 42
NEWPORT — 10-11-13-10 — 44
Cooper (42) — Rondon 16, Ajaezu 9, Johnson 9, Lutz 6, Ollier 2
Newport (44) — Miller 16, Turner 10, Kinney 10, Covington 8