Boone County has had quite the turnaround this season and it doesn’t look like the
Rebels plan on slowing down anytime soon.
After losing the last eleven meetings to Conner, the Rebels survived a thriller to
defeat the Cougars 84-82 at home on Friday night. It was their first win against the district foe since 2018.
“Our guys fight. They’ve fought all year,” Rebels coach Nathan Browning said. “They play with a chip on their shoulder because I’ve got the guys I had last year and we struggled last year and didn’t win a whole lot of games. They want to win. They’re willing to do whatever they have to do.”
At first Boone County controlled the tempo. The Rebels were using high-low action
with Maddox Jones who finished with 22 points to try and penetrate Conner’s
defense, whether it was man-to-man or zone.
“I thought in spurts our defense was good. Man was okay in the first half,” Cougars coach Matthew Otte said. “We had moments where it was good and moments where we didn’t do intelligent things. To start the second half, we were still in the zone when we erased an eight-point deficit. They’re good and they’ve got guys that can score so you get down enough, you have to go to man just to see what happens.”
The Cougars terrific shooting night kept them close. They hit 13 three-pointers,
eight coming in the second half.
After trailing 40-32 at halftime, Conner went on an 11-2 run pushing them ahead by
one that caused Boone County to call a timeout with 5:45 left in the third quarter.
The timeout was nothing short of effective. The Rebels would go on their own run,
outscoring the Cougars 17-6 the rest of the quarter.
“We just talked about what we had been focused on at halftime,” Browning said. “Take away their shooters. Try to get to the shooters with a hand high. We weren’t doing that in the first couple minutes of the third quarter.”
Down the stretch, Brady Bushman and Finn Louden were huge for Conner. Louden
led with 26 and Bushman who finished with 22 points and six three-pointers (four in
the fourth quarter), brought the Cougars back within three with just under two
minutes remaining.
“We did a good job of attacking then reading once we got in there,” Otte said. “If nobody helped off then we went and scored. If people came in, we were good enough to kick it out
and be ready to shoot it. We were in rhythm and knocked quite a few down to keep
us in it.”
Then chaos ensued.
Down three with just a few seconds, Finn Louden tried a 3-pointer that ended up
short, but a travel call on Boone County gave it right back with 0.4 seconds to go. A
foul sent Louden to the free throw line where he made one and missed the second
on purpose…but the tip-in attempt to send the game to overtime was no good.
With the victory, the Rebels are now 12-3, 6-1 in region and 2-0 in district play. A win at Cooper next week clinches the No. 1 seed in the 33rd District Tournament.
Boone County had four players in double digits along with Maddox Jones, led by
Thomas Williams with 22, Mason Hall with 17, and Eli Bodkin contributing 13.
The Rebels look to add another region win, Wednesday against Beechwood at
7:30 p.m.
Conner goes back home for a matchup with Grant County Tuesday at 7 p.m.
REBELS 84, COUGARS 82
BOONE COUNTY — 20-20-21-23 — 84
CONNER — 15-17-17-33 — 82
Scoring
Boone County (84) — Williams 25, Jones 22, Hall 17, Bodkin 13, Burks 5, Clos 2
Conner (82) — Louden 26, Bushman 22, L. Warner 16, T. Warner 7, Huff 6,
Romero 3, Abousaleh 2
Game Stats
3-Pointers Made: Boone County 6, Conner 13
Free Throws: Boone County 12/18, Conner 13/18
Fouls: Boone County 14, Conner 19
Records: Boone County 12-3, Conner 3-12
GIRLS
Conner 50, Boone County 30
It’s a new year for the Conner Lady Cougars.
They’ve finally hit their stride, winning five of their last six, including a 50-30 win over Boone County on Friday night.
“New year. New us,” Conner senior guard Anna Hamilton said. “We started off slow and now that we’ve had some team bonding over Christmas, I feel like we’ve all pulled it together.”
From beginning to finish, it was a physical game. For Conner it was something a little different, but they fought back and it paid off.
“At one point, I knew there had been 40 free throws shot,” Cougars coach Michelle Gambrel said. “I’m not sure we’ve been in a game all season with 40. Us being physical right back caused that. It hasn’t always been like that this year so us being physical and taking it to the hole and not just settling on our threes helped our scoring.”
Boone County used the physicality to their advantage, getting to the line 21 times.
“We took a big step from when we played them last year to this year,” Rebels head coach Todd Humphrey said. “We play physical, they played physical, and I’m proud of how we fought with them and competed for most of the game.”
While the Lady Rebels did push themselves on the defensive end, their lack of offense showed.
Only three players made it in the scoring column for Boone County. Joslyn Humphrey had 11, Lyric Hooper had nine and Mya Bennett ended with nine.
“We’ve been working on that a lot this year. We’ve been trying to get more girls involved and figure out how to get the girls more confidence,” Humphrey said. “We’re still a young team. Defensively we picked it up a little bit which helped our offense.”
Once the Lady Cougars figured out how to match the intensity level, they were able to find a rhythm on offense because of their passing in transition and ball movement.
At the end of the first quarter, they led 8-7. By halftime it was 25-7.
“We struggled to put the ball in the hoop in the first quarter, so we had to move the ball around. I told everyone to run the floor because I’ll find you,” Hamilton said. “Running the floor was huge for us and just moving the ball around. Shots finally started to fall.”
Hamilton led Conner with 14, but eight others scored as well.
Their scoring had improved and so had their defense. Rebounding can also be added to the list.
“It’s a competition every game because rebounding is what I was worried about this year due to losing so much from last year,” Gambrel said. “Every game we see who can win that defensive game and I think the girls have responded to wanting to get on the boards.”
The Lady Cougars will try and add on to their success as they take on Newport Central Catholic and Grant County next, but a massive meeting with another district opponent in Ryle Jan. 19 at 6 p.m. is what’s circled on their calendar.
“This one, next week at Ryle. That’s what we’re working for,” Gambrel said. “We had a brutal schedule of that stretch in December and we did that on purpose to make sure we’re ready for this.”
Boone County falls to 3-12 and stays at home to take on Bishop Brossart Tuesday at 7:30 p.m.
LADY COUGARS 50, LADY REBELS 30
BOONE COUNTY — 7-4-13-6 — 30
CONNER — 8-17-10-15 — 50
Scoring
Boone County (30) — Humphrey 11, Hooper 10, Bennett 9
Conner (50) — Hamilton 14, Kerns 9, Depenbrock 8, Gutzwiller 6, Brown 5,
Burchem 3, Everett 3, Fisher 2
Game Stats
3-Pointers Made: Boone County 3, Conner 3
Free Throws: Boone County 9/21, Conner 17/22
Fouls: Boone County 13, Conner 19
Records: Boone County 3-12, Conner 7-10