All ‘A’ ends early for Big Blue teams, that’s why we play the game

Monday night’s Clinton County – Monroe County All “A” regional opener ended with one not so surprising and one surprising but not shocking results.

Although our Lady Dawgs put up a nice effort, it was the Lady Falcons who earned the right to advance to the next round of All “A” Regional play with a 67-44 win Monday in The Castle.

No real surprise there, as anything else would have been an upset heard across the Commonwealth after you realize that Monroe County’s Lady Falcons came into the game one of the top rated squads in the state – standing at No. 16 in Monday’s Cantrall ratings from the Lexington Herald Leader. I expect Monroe to advance to the All “A” State when all is said and done this week.

On the boys’ side, the Bulldogs hit the wall, so to speak, in their quest to advance in the All “A” Classic regional play Monday night, and that wall wasn’t necessarily anything that Monroe threw at them in the form of a surprise, but rather our own inability to play the kind of game that has been the norm for the Dawgs this season.

Not taking anything away from Coach Steve Kirkpatrick’s Falcons – they are a nice team, and just a point or so below Clinton County in the ratings, but the Bulldogs had the game that most of us close to the program have been silently dreading for several weeks – the night that nothing would work up against a good opponent.

That was Monday night. We jumped out to control a nice, early, double-digit lead, then we watched as our game unraveled completely. We couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn – as the old saying goes – and Monroe was smart enough to take it right to us and at the same time – they seemingly couldn’t miss.

Didn’t matter if they threw it up through three sets of defending hands, or just tossed it up backwards without looking at the goal – it was going to go in.

The Dawgs missed free throws and passed the basketball like they all had 10 thumbs and in the end – sometimes you get the Falcon, sometimes the Falcon gets you.

So, Bulldogs, Lady Bulldogs, coaches, staffs and fans – the All “A” run is over – and yes, over this year earlier that we would have liked, but there are bigger things ahead anyway – like the rest of the regular season.

On to the next four weeks!

Bulldogs sweep 16th, Lady Dawgs can do no worse than second

A very nice crowd of Big Blue fans made the short trip across Wolf Creek Dam last Friday night to support our Lady Dawgs and Bulldogs as they took on 16th District rival Russell County.

When the night was done, the score was Clinton County 2, Russell County 0.

After two down to the wire basketball games, including a Clinton County Lady Bulldog overtime victory to get things started out, our Big Blue squads came home with a couple of victories in tow.

Nice night for both teams – those two wins were huge!

What it meant for Clinton County was that the 16th District regular season games are now behind us and our Bulldogs finished those six contests with a sweep – a perfect 6-0 record to wrap up a Number 1 seed when the district tournament pairings are put together.

This year’s post-season run will begin at Clinton County High School’s Lindle Castle Gymnasium on the district level. As for which team will fill which of the remaining three seed positions, that’s still entirely up in the air.

Russell County, now 2-2, still has a game each with Cumberland County 0-4, and Metcalfe County, 1-3, and the Panthers and Hornets must also face each other on down the road before the final seed positions are determined.

On the girls’ side of the issue, we do know that the Lady Dawgs are also finished with 16th District regular season games with a 4-2 mark, and will finish no worse than second place, but the No. 1 seed is clearly in their sights.

Cumberland County is currently 3-1 and still has a game against Russell County, 2-2, and Metcalfe County, 0-4, and the Lady Lakers and Lady Hornets will also face off one more time.

Schedule changes, games added, time change

Tis is the season for change – as is always the case with high school basketball that depends on weather and tournament outcomes.

The Lady Dawgs have picked up a game this Friday, January 24, and will be traveling to Casey County to take on the Lady Rebels. Junior varsity tips at 5:30 p.m., followed by the varsity.

The Bulldogs will host Whitley County this Friday, January 24, at The Castle, in a makeup from an earlier snow postponement. Junior varsity tips at 5:30, followed by the varsity.

We will try to get an additional reminder in this space on down the road as this game gets closer, but make a time change on your schedules for the February 15 Bulldog trip to South Laurel. Junior varsity is set to tip at 4:30 central, followed by the varsity tip at about 6:00 p.m., central. Those times represent a one-hour earlier start than what was previously planned.