Less than two weeks into the season, an atmosphere that had the feel of a championship game between two top-10 ranked rivals in Region One, gave the near capacity crowd at Reed Conder Gymnasium a thriller of a game.
Leading by as many as 15 points early in the second quarter after a great start by Marshall County, McCracken County trailing most of the game, rallied from behind to tie the game with 3:45 remaining and took their first lead with 1:30 left on a 3-pointer by Jackson Sivills, closing out the four-point win.
“We got a lot of open looks, we had a lot of 15 footers…12 footers…3-pointers…driving the lane, and the ball would just not go in the basket”, Head Coach Terry Birdsong said of the Marshals dwindling lead. “We had two bad stretches like that, one in the first half and then a critical time when we were up by 12.”
That critical time came in the third quarter with a 45-33 lead that vanished on a 10-0 run by the Mustangs to cut it to two and it was a one-point game to start the fourth quarter. After Zion Harmon’s three to open the quarter, McCracken County tied it up at 51 on another three from Noah Dumas and with 46 seconds to go, a couple of looks for the Marshals from behind the arc miss. Harmon hit two spectacular threes, the second off-balance with 2.6 seconds to go, cutting the lead to three.
A foul on Ronnie Jones put him on the line where he missed both leaving the door open for the Marshals, but Sivills came down with the rebound and was immediately fouled and with two seconds remaining, hit the first of two at the line to secure the Mustangs win.
Harmon set the tone early for the Marshals with two straight threes to open the game on his way to a 40-point night. Sivills led McCracken County with 24 points.
Birdsong said with the same nucleus of players that have been together for a while, they sometimes lose focus on what they are trying to do so efforts are to continue to simplify the game. With Harmon double-teamed, Birdsong said his players have to be ready and confident to knock down shots.
“We’re playing a tough schedule”, Birdsong said. “That was our fifth game that we’ve played four of the top 15 teams in the state and we play the defending state champ in Briarcrest (Tenn.) tomorrow. I’m excited about that game because it will tell us a lot about our kids. Are they going to go in there and just lay down after a tough loss tonight or go in there and compete and fight and try to win the game.”
McCracken County 6 29 46 63
Marshall County 16 32 47 59
Scoring:
McCracken County: Jackson Sivills 25, Noah Dumas 16, Ronnie Jones 9, Ramon Heard 6, Ian McCune 3, Ian Hart 2
Marshall County: Zion Harmon 40, Tyler Stokes 11, Kaden Driver 2, Tyler Powell 2, Bryce Flatt 2, Brady Miller 2
