Rick Hartzell was in the stands at The Fieldhouse Friday to watch his stepson, Campbell County guard Garyn Jackson, in the semifinals of the Mason County Invitational Tournament.
“I think we’ve got a tough team that’s awful scrappy,” Hartzell said.
The Royals could testify to the Camels’ strength and determination. Jackson was the leader – his 18 points helped his team to a 69-58 semifinal win.
Jackson was 6-for-6 from the field and 6-for-8 from the free throw line. He also served four assists and had a steal.
“I guess we are scrappy,” Jackson said. “It’s just the way we go for the ball; it’s our defense.”
Campbell County (8-1) thus meets North Oldham for the championship at 4 p.m. Saturday. The Mustangs beat Walton-Verona, 70-58.
Camels’ coach Brent Sowder wasn’t sure where Friday’s win was bigger than the other seven.
“They all feel big in the moment, but this is a really good win,” Sowder said.
The Camels also ended a nearly four-season, five-game losing streak to Mason County. Before Friday, the last win was a 74-51 win in the 10th Region semifinals in 2019.
Campbell County is in the championship game for at least four reasons: Cole Johnson and Broc Sorgenfrei scoring 15 points apiece; outscoring Mason County, 13-9, in the fourth quarter; getting 10 points and 13 rebounds from Connor Weinel; and limiting the Royals to just one field goal over the final 4:41.
Mason County (7-4) coach Brian Kirk, meanwhile, identified a fifth and sixth factor – Campbell County’s 15-0 score in second-chance points and the 27-20 edge in rebounding.
“We just didn’t make shots,” Kirk said. “We had some good shots; that’s part of the game of basketball … They killed us on the glass; 15-zero on second chance points against a solid team with Campbell County, you’re not going to win those type of games.”
Johnson’s teammates call him “Mr. Perfect” for his 36 on the ACT test. He said that doesn’t translate to basketball.
“I overthink a lot on the court,” Johnson said.
Sowder was glad he listened to assistant Brett White’s halftime suggestion: guarding Mason County’s ball screens at the top of the key to prevent getting lost on defense.
“It really paid dividends,” Sowder said. “What happened was, we were letting them get to the rim unimpeded, and were able to make them finish over our hands, which was big.”
Mason County cut Campbell County’s lead to 58-55 on Cayden Reed’s bucket with 4:41 left. The Royals didn’t score again until Blake Reed’s free throw with 54.6 seconds remaining and added just one more field goal, Landon Scilley’s bucket with 32 seconds to go.
Mason County and Walton-Verona meet for third place at 12:30 p.m.
To Sowder, Friday was the latest example of team trust.
“They’ve played together since they were kids, and they’ve got that trust in each other,” Sowder said. “It’s a fun thing to watch.”
CAMELS 69, ROYALS 58
CAMPBELL CO. — 10-27–19-13 — 69
MASON CO. — 15-19-15-9 — 58
Scoring
CAMPBELL CO. (69) —Franzen 8, Sorgenfrei 15, Fancher 1, Jackson 18, Johnson 15, Smith 2, Weinel 10.
MASON CO. (58) —Hamilton 5, B. Reed 20, Feldhaus 12, C. Reed 11, McClanahan 4, Horch 2, Scilley 4.
Game Stats
Field Goals: CC 27/50, MC 23/41.
3-Pointers: CC 5/12, MC 3/11.
Free Throws: CC 10/14, MC 9/13
Rebounds: CC 27, MC 20.
Assists: CC 8, MC 7
Turnovers: CC 9, MC 10.
Records: Campbell County 8-1, Mason County 7-4.
Semifinals
North Oldham 70, Walton-Verona 58
The Bearcats didn’t guard their yard, coach Mike Hester said.
The Eagles didn’t have many answers for the Mustangs’ trio of Grant Neal, Jack Fischer and Jakobi McRoberts, either. They scored 20, 14 and 14 points, respectively.
Friday was Walton-Verona’s second loss in 16 days to their Eighth Region foe. (The Mustangs won, 82-74 on Dec. 13.)
“We’re used to playing them all the time,” North Oldham coach David Levitch II said. “They call out all our plays, we call out all their plays.”
Hester defines “guard your yard” as each player staying with and stopping one opponent, and because the Bearcats didn’t for long stretches, there were more “paint touches” than when you want to remodel your living room.
“We didn’t do a good job of guarding Fischer or Neal,” Hester said. “They got a lot of paint touches, and when you get paint touches, you can make things happen, and that’s what they were able to do.”
The Bearcats’ Aaron Gutman praised Fischer.
“He did really good at getting me out of the way in the paint, getting up under me,” Gutman said. “I allowed him to get down there to do that.”
When Fischer made a layup 35 seconds into the first quarter, it might have looked like a commonplace field goal, but it was also a microcosm of how the Mustangs ran past the Bearcats. Of North Oldham’s 11 first-quarter field goals, 10 were either break-out layups or short jumpers.
“They beat us at our own game,” Hester said. “We want to obviously play an up-and-down style … They had a stretch of transition buckets, probably six to eight of ‘em. That was the difference in the game.”
Walton-Verona stayed close with 3-pointers. Landon Bach, Zach Smith (who led everyone with 22 points) and Julian Dixon each knocked down one, and the Bearcats knotted things at 11-all with a little more than three minutes left.
Whereupon North Oldham unfurled a 12-3 run over the final 3:07 – all on layups or short jumpers.
Gutman was second on the scoresheet with 21 points – which included a personal 7-0 streak a little more than a minute into the second stanza. The result: the Mustangs led by just 23-21.
Problem was, Walton-Verona was never that close the rest of the night.
North Oldham’s 17-9 streak included Neal’s eight points, Brooks Cargould’s five, Ryan Sanders’ two and Gray Schmittel’s free throw.
Smith’s two free throws pulled Walton-Verona to within 42-35 with 5:23 left in the third quarter, but the Mustangs took a 56-46 lead on Ryan Howard’s 3 with under a minute to go.
NORTH OLDHAM 23 17 16 14 – 70
WALTON-VERONA 14 16 16 12 – 58
North Oldham (70) — Fischer 14, Neal 20, McRoberts, 14, Howard 9, Sanders 7, Cargould 5, Schmittel 1. 3-Pt. FG: 4 (McRoberts 2, Howard, Cargould). FT: 4/7. Fouls: 9. Fouled out: None.
Walton-Verona (58) — Montgomery 3, Smith 22, Bach 3, Dixon 9, Gutman 21. 3-Pt. FG: 6 (Smith 3, Montgomery, Bach, Dixon). FT: 5/6. Fouls: 11. Fouled out: None.
Records: North Oldham 9-2, Walton-Verona 9-3.
Consolation bracket
Augusta 65, Scott 52
Augusta’s (8-2) Kylan Hinson led all scorers with 18 points including a buzzer-beater to win it, Connor Snapp scored 16, Keeton Bach had 14, and Devante Jefferson added 10.
Xarek Sarakatsannis led the Eagles (6-7) with 14 points, Connor Griffin had 12, and Dylan Giffen and Carter Eten added 11 each.
Scott takes on Tates Creek for seventh place at 11 a.m. Saturday, and Augusta meets Pike County Central for fifth place at 2:30 p.m.
SCOTT 20 12 15 15 – 62
AUGUSTA 13 17 17 18 – 65
Scott (62) — Giffen 11, Saratkatsannis 13, Griffin 12, Evans 9, Lowe 6, Eten 11. 3-Pt. FG: 7 (Evans 3, Saratkatsannis 2, Giffen, Griffin). FT: 6/6. Fouls: 17. Fouled out: None.
Augusta (65) — Jefferson 10, Hinson 18, Bach 14, Snapp 16, Young 5, Kelsch 2. 3-Pt. FG: 9 (Hinson 5, Bach 2, Snapp, Young). FT: 9/17. Fouls: 7. Fouled out: None.
Records: Scott 6-7, Augusta 8-2.