The most drama of the day at the boys 9th Region tournament quarterfinals came on the first game of the day while the other three spared us any late game defining moments.
Conner took down Highlands in a high scoring affair that came down to the last shot while Covington Catholic cruised past Dixie Heights, Lloyd Memorial looked dialed in for a win over Holy Cross and Ryle won a sleeper over Newport in the nightcap in games played at Northern Kentucky University’s Truist Arena.
Semifinals are Sunday with Conner taking on Covington Catholic at 6:30 p.m., Lloyd Memorial and Ryle clashing at 8 p.m.
The championship game is Tuesday at 7 p.m.
Here’s how the action played out on Saturday with takeaways from each game.
Conner 79, Highlands 76
The Cougars overcame a 10-point deficit and then survived after building a seven-point lead with less than two minutes remaining.
Highlands region tournament winless drought stretched to five years as 3-pointers from Vinny Listerman and Owen Ebert were unable to go in the closing seconds, giving Conner their first region tournament win since 2021 when they reached the region championship and were defeated by eventual state champion Highlands.
“You coach a group of guys that work so hard all year long, from October 15 all the way through, you just don’t want it to end,” Cougars coach Nathan Browning said. “You just want it to keep going. We got a special group of seniors that just worked their butt off for us. I just wasn’t ready to be done with them. I want to keep coaching them.”
Finn-tastic
Conner’s Finn Louden kept Conner in it throughout, hitting key bucket after key bucket when the Cougars needed it most. He finished with 36 points on just 17 shots, hitting 6-of-8 from the 3-point line and 10-of-14 from the free throw line.
“Finn is a special guy, man,” Browning said. “Getting to coach him and seeing what he does on the floor. Sometimes we’ll be calling a play, he either doesn’t hear us, or he goes on his own and just makes a play. You got to live with that sometimes because he makes more plays than he doesn’t.”
Louden had 17 at halftime and scored 14 in the third as the Cougars turned a 34-24 deficit into a 57-57 deadlock at the end of three quarters.
When Highlands opened up with the first four points of the fourth, Louden’s 3-pointer ignited a 10-0 Conner run and a lead they’d never relinquish the rest of the way.
“I trust my teammates, but sometimes you just got to go get a bucket,” Louden said. “When we go down, I feel like that’s when I really need to step up.”
Rondon provides bench punch
Many people are familiar with the last name Rondon as Yamil Rondon played pivotal roles for both Cooper and Newport in the past three region tournaments. Rondon spent his first three seasons of his high school career at Cooper before transferring to Newport.
Now it’s his younger brother’s turn, Juan. Juan Rondon was at Newport last season before transferring to Conner this year. The sophomore came off the bench and scored 14 points, nine of them coming in the fourth quarter to help Conner prevail.
Not to be overshadowed, Tyler Warner had a big game on the glass, collecting a double-double with 11 points and 10 rebounds. A lot of his activity was in the first half when he nearly had the double-double in the game’s first 16 minutes with eight points and nine rebounds.
Bushman brings the clutch moments
Brady Bushman is well known for his abilites on the baseball field and his arm was on display in a key moment of Saturday’s game.
At 75-74 Conner and underneath Highlands’ basket, he threw a full court pass to Rondon for a layup.
He then provided the biggest defensive play of the game when he blocked Owen Ebert’s shot, collected the loose ball and knocked down two free throws with 11 seconds left in the game to make it 79-76.
“There was a little bit of a miscommunication,” Bushman said. “I said switch and we didn’t switch. So I look back, ball is coming over and I’ve been reading him all game. He was always pump faking. So he never went up on the first one. So I sat on it, I jumped, tipped it and got it.”
Bushman finished with 10 points, five rebounds, four assists, a steal and the vital blocked shot.
Wimzie ahead of his years
Highlands turned to eighth grader Amil Wimzie in the postseason to be in the starting lineup and he didn’t disappoint on the big stage.
He led the Bluebirds in scoring on Saturday, tallying 19 points as he hit 8-of-12 shots from the field in 20 minutes of action.
“He’s a guy we felt like he could be a little bit more relaxed in the starting lineup,” Bluebirds coach Kevin Listerman said. “We felt like we needed another guy who could attack the rim and he did a great job.”
Wimzie showed the moment isn’t too big for him despite his youth.
Senior Owen Ebert took the move in stride and provided a boost off the Bluebirds bench. He scored 12 points on Saturday, knocking down three 3-pointers, his last make coming from well beyond the college 3-point line to make it 75-74 with 1:30 to play.
“Those guys didn’t bat an eye when we made the change,” Listerman said. “Owen had a great night night tonight. Hit some big threes.”
His last look at the buzzer looked good, but bounced off the rim.
Senior swan song
Highlands will say goodbye to eight seniors, five of them that received significant playing time. That list includes Finn Bouldin, Owen Ebert, Nathan Rickard and Vinny Listerman. All four averaged double figure scoring this season.
“Those seniors are so tough, they’re resilient and they battle,” Kevin Listerman said. “Just couldn’t get back over the hump today. It’s tough because we did so many good things throughout the year to not finish those couple plays. Just really, really hurts.”
Covington Catholic 71, Dixie Heights 41
It was a 15-15 game a couple minutes into the second quarter, by the time the five-minute mark hit in the third quarter it was 44-19 CovCath.
The spurts were fueled by Dixie Heights turnovers as the game flipped on its head. Dixie had 14 turnovers at halftime as CovCath held a 19-2 edge in points off turnovers.
“At 15-15, we didn’t get much more than maybe five shots up the rest of the quarter in the second quarter,” Dixie coach Scott Code said. “We obviously had way too many turnovers. Too many live ball turnovers.”
It lingered into the third as CovCath opened the lead to as much as 31 in the quarter.
Cash money
Covington Catholic’s Cash Harney has taken a backseat to scoring this year, his points per game average down from the prior two years as Braeden Myrick came aboard to pair with Athens McGillis as the 1-2 scoring punch.
But Saturday he posted 20 points as he was solid in transition and still got others involved. He added seven assists to go with four steals.
“They’re face guarding our two players, Athens and Braeden. I feel like that makes me Donny (Bradshaw) and Teagan (Stava) have to step up,” Harney said. “When we do, we’re gonna be hard to stop. When we play as a team when we’re all hitting shots, that’s gonna be when we’re hardest to stop.”
Harney hit 8-of-13 shots from the field in the efficient afternoon. He and Athens McGillis combined for eight steals, a good couple of them pickpocketing Dixie Heights ball handlers and turning them into layups on the other end.
Turnovers, turnovers turnovers
The catalyst in the deficit can be pointed to turnovers. Dixie struggled to take care of it from about the five-minute mark on in the second and the separation proved it.
“Our defense is based on relentless pressure,” Covington Catholic coach Jake Thelen said. “Defense creates offense. We really take pride in how we play defensively and if we stay solid and continue doing what we’re doing I like our chances.”
They finished with 21 turnovers to CovCath’s seven, CovCath finishing with a 29-4 points off turnovers edge.
Cold shooting
Even with the 30-point victory, CovCath didn’t shoot it the best or numbers we’ve been accustomed to seeing all season long. They went 5-of-28 from the 3-point line. Maybe chalk it up to the time in between games.
“When you have eight days to prepare for somebody, I knew we would come out kind of like that, kind of back and forth for a little bit,” Thelen said. “I just told our guys, if we just keep attacking and getting downhill and making good plays, I like the shots that we’ll get. They’ll fall.”
They also hit just 6-of-11 from the free throw line. Over the course of the season, they were hitting 3-pointers at a near 40% clip and 70% from the free throw line.
The draw Gods don’t favor Dixie
Dixie’s senior class finished with 57 wins in their last three seasons, but they ran into Lloyd Memorial in their district and Covington Catholic in the first round of the region tournament the past three seasons.
“You don’t have to be a math expert, but one out of three chance every three years that comes out to about a 3% chance of that happening,” Code said. “And I’ll be darned we had the 3% chance. Right now, the road runs through them. We had a shot, but obviously came up drastically short.”
Smart guys
Dixie’s senior class isn’t big, just four of them and three of them are in the Governor’s Scholars Program.
“Going to practice every day is a privilege to be around these kids,” Code said. “Nobody gets in trouble. Behavior wise, nobody has academic eligibility issues. I mean, truly, truly blessed to have that group.”
Lloyd Memorial 63, Holy Cross 50
Take away a 7-0 Indians run in the final minute, and this was every bit of a 20-point game.
Lloyd Memorial was poised and under control from start to finish as they took away Indians leading scorer Luke Arlinghaus from the game plan and dominated this one.
“He’s the head of the snake. Gotta chop it off,” Juggernauts coach Walker said. “That was a big deal. We felt like if we pressured him and made him uncomfortable to take tough shots, it would make others hard to get in rhythm.”
Holy Cross led 4-3 and the Juggernauts made a 24-4 run from that point before taking a 31-15 lead into halftime. They stretched the lead to 22 in the third and led by as much as 23 late.
Juggernauts just keep winning
The consensus of preseason polls had the Juggernauts outside of the top in the region with all they had lost, including the program’s all-time leading scorer EJ Walker, who now plays SEC basketball at South Carolina.
Despite what was lost and the outsiders looking in as more pessimistic than optimistic, the Juggernauts are now 23-4, won a fourth straight district championship and a region tournament game for the fourth straight season.
Mike Walker and his staff keep getting it done.
“It’s amazing. A lot of people told me not to take this job when I left junior college,” Walker said. “It’s our philosophy and our vision. I got a hell of a staff and I got kids that want to buy in and that’s what it takes. No one counted us in this year. I took offense to that because my staff does a hell of a job with skill development and just development overall.”
It’s not just Blaackar, either
Anthony Blaackar is the straw that stirs the drink, but the Juggernauts jumped out to a 18-8 lead before he scored his first points nearly 11 minutes into the game.
Jason Kabeya, Isaiah Coleman, Isiah Golsby and Colten Barger all had big moments throughout on Saturday evening.
“If teams want to take Anthony away I’ve got five, six, seven other guys that can contribute,” Walker said.
Blaackar still got his, too. He finished with 26 points, hit all three of his 3-point attempts and grabbed eight rebounds to go with four assists, three steals and two blocked shots.
“It doesn’t always have to be me scoring. Whenever a team like that keys in on me and they want to face guard, they want to deny me the ball, or box and one, whatever they want to do, I trust my guys enough to go out there and get the win and really that’s what we did tonight,” Blaackar said.
Indians farewell to talented senior trio
Luke Arlinghaus, Brady Gabbard and Nate Rominger have been a huge part of the Indians success the past three seasons. The trio helped guide the Indians to 54 victories over the last three seasons and combined to score 3,215 points.
“When I came in as they were sophomores, no one expected Holy Cross to be anything again,” Indians coach Ricardo Johnson said. “Those guys, two out of three years going to the to the Region Tournament, they’ll remember this opportunity, what the process was like 20 years from now. They’ll look back and say, ‘Hey, I played at NKU.’ They know what it takes behind the scenes to do it, just being able to have that memory forever.”
Gabbard tallied 24 points on Saturday evening including a couple of thunderous dunks. Lloyd stifled Arlinghaus and Rominger, however, holding the two to 15 points and 5-of-18 from the field.
The three are part of a six-member senior class for the Indians.
Ryle 56, Newport 46
This one wasn’t exactly beautiful basketball, but in a coach vs mentor kind of game, Ryle’s Nick Dorning had a feeling it would look this way. Dorning was on Newport’s Rod Snapp’s staff for several years before heading to Ryle.
“I love Snapp.” Dorning said. “I know how he likes to play these kinds of games. We talked to our kids today about how they’re going to look to slow the game down and run a lot of offense. They’re going to be super tough, super physical. They’re going to rebound the ball extremely well.”
With Newport able to keep the game at the pace they wanted, Ryle just got physical, a staple of their program. The Raiders methodically pulled away after a slow start and opened the second half to open up a 28-19 lead. Newport never got closer than four from there.
“We tend to be the aggressor and the more physical team when we play,” Dorning said. “So we had to come in at halftime and challenge our guys to get on the glass. And they all did that, and we ended up winning the rebound battle by one.”
Coppola makes the engine go
Without Anthony Coppola, Ryle is probably on the losing end of this one. Despite the Raiders slow start, Coppola had nine of their first 11 points to keep them close and trailing 12-11. Trailing 16-13, his layup ignited a 6-0 run and the Raiders never trailed from that point.
“Anthony’s our leader and as one of our coaches said in there, that’s our quarterback,” Dorning said. “This is the third time in three years that he’s played in this game and he wasn’t going to let anything stop him from getting to the next round and giving himself at least 32 more minutes.”
Rewinding back two years, Coppola was the one who nearly sent region champion Newport home in the first round with his performance. Now in his third year as a starter and third year playing in this tournament, the moment is nowhere near too big for him.
“We were a little stagnant early, not playing for a whole week, some of these guys first time at region,” Coppola said. “My experience I felt comfortable here and I was able to keep us in the game at the start with our slow start and just rebound in the second half to then play our basketball.”
He finished the night with a team-high 16 points and didn’t turn it over once.
Nsuti a monster on the boards
Ryle’s Grace Nsuti was saddled with early foul trouble, playing just 5:20 in the first half and held scoreless with three rebounds. With a clean slate in the second half, Nsuti got after it on the glass with 10 rebounds, finishing with 13 and five of them on the offensive end. It helped Ryle on the defensive end as Newport tallied 10 offensive rebounds in the first half.
Taking care of the rock
Both teams handled the ball exceptionally well, combining for just 11 turnovers. Ryle had five, Newport had six. Now the shooting numbers are left to be desired. They combined to shoot 39-of-98 from the field, 4-of-22 from three.
Lowe preseason region player of the year?
Ryle made it rough on Newport leading scorer Amontae Lowe. He was held scoreless for nearly three quarters before he finished with 11 points, hitting 4-of-13 shots and 1-of-7 from deep.
“They were tough and physical with him and that’s what Ryle preaches,” Wildcats coach Rod Snapp said. “They bumped him off cuts. They bumped him off drives. When he got down into paint, they just walled up and made him shoot over them.”
Despite a less than normal performance for the junior guard, Lowe might be the preseason favorite for Region Player of the Year next year.
A breathe of fresh air
The expectations were a lot more reduced for Newport than prior years. With three of their top players departed via the prep school route, the Wildcats weren’t expected to do much this season.
They proved people wrong with 21 victories and a regional All “A” title, beating Holy Cross on their home floor for the championship.
“It was a fun year. I’m super proud of them,” Snapp said. “If somebody would have told us we’d win 21 games I would have said no chance. The kids were extremely coachable and it was a fantastic group.”
Expectations will ramp back up next year though as they only lose two seniors in Keegan Farrell and Irvan Nichols.