Warren East 85 - Metcalfe County 70

Warren East High School, Bristow, Kentucky 01-12-08

It's a wonder that a Star Trek convention didn't break out at Saturday's game at Warren East. The Raiders featured DeAngelo Kirk, and the Metcalfe County Hornets had a center named Will Warf. Kirk and Warf? I started looking for geeky people wearing Star Trek uniforms walking around talking about how they spent last summer at Klingon Language Camp.

The real story from Metcalfe County's game against Warren East is that their star player, Trey Shirley, missed the game due to an illness. No one seems to know what is wrong with the kid, but a couple of Hornets fans told me that they had to run a CAT scan on him last night. All the Metcalfe fans seemed worried about the Shirley and less concerned that their team would be short a player who averages over 20 points a game.

I'm sure that Edmonton has a good hospital. I know that in some small towns if someone needed a CAT scan it might just involve a cat.

Pennyrile Pick and Roll looks forward to seeing Trey Shirley back on the hardwood and wishes him and his family all the best.

There was a large contingent of Metcalfe County fans at the ballgame. I heard one alumnus say, "you can't hide that Hornet pride." They have every reason to be proud, too, because they rolled into Friday's game with an impressive 13-1 record, with their only loss coming to a school from Washington, D.C. They were undefeated in the region, too.

The Metcalfe County fans were quiet. The only buzz coming from that swarm of maroon clad hornets was about their star player not being with the team. In fact, it is possibly the quietest basketball crowd of which I've been a part. Both sets of fans sat in the stands almost as if they were in church. When the teams started playing, the players didn't even chatter.

In the first quarter Metcalfe and East went at each other like good basketball teams do in a big game. I won't say that they swapped buckets, but one team would surge, and the other would respond. Both teams like to press and will press even after missed baskets. Metcalfe County even pressed after a turnover. They do it well, too.

At the end of the first quarter, the Raiders had a precarious 18-16 lead.

In the second quarter, Metcalfe County's guards kept challenging Warren East's interior defense, and the Raiders kept blocking their shots. I thought maybe they should try to spread Warren East's defense out a little with some perimeter shooting, and maybe that's what the Hornets lack without Trey Shirley in the lineup.

I would later discover something about Metcalfe County that I have missed all season. I think it is something that everyone has missed. They aren't just Trey Shirley. They are a good basketball team, and Will Warf -- the very un-Klingon like post player for the Hornets -- is probably the guy that holds Metcalfe together. I should note that he is Metcalfe's starting quarterback on the gridiron and won back-to-back Region Three Player-of-the-Year awards.

In the second quarter, however, Shenard Holton and Jordan Ellis made some big plays for the Raiders. I like the athletic ability of Ellis, but he's got to learn to move his feet on defense and quit slapping at defenders. He had his third foul with 5:22 left in the half. Ouch! He can't serve his team while doing a Bill Keightly impersonation in the first half.

Warren East expanded their lead to 35-31.

In the third quarter, Metcalfe opened with a tricky match up 3-2 zone. It was a good defense, but they couldn't close the gap between the guards and the baseline players. East's Shenard Holton kept finding a way into the middle of the zone and kept finding ways to score. He finished the game with 15 points.

The Hornets, however, outscored Warren East 18-17 in the quarter and stayed within striking distance of the Raiders.

The fourth quarter didn't turn out too well for Metcalfe. Holton kept getting loose in their zone, and DeAngelo Kirk bombed a couple of three pointers from the wing and hit a couple of nice looking pull-up jump shots -- a lost or dying art in all of basketball. The Hornets' defense seemed to be unable to find Kirk on the wing, and he made them pay for it.

Will Warf kept them in the game. How can someone with a Klingon name counter a team with a player named Kirk? Warf made some impressive moves around the basket in the final frame, and that's when I realized that he's a heck of a basketball player. He's gritty, hard-nosed, and he would not surrender to Kirk and his Raiders. Warf finished the game with 27 points and 13 boards. He also made himself one of my favorite players in the region. I look forward to seeing him play in Diddle Arena in March.

Warren East won the game 85-70. That score does not give a good perspective on what type of ballgame Saturday's game was. The game got away from Metcalfe County in the final minutes. The Hornets played Clinton County the night before in Edmonton, so they looked a little tired. However, Warren East played Allen County-Scottsville the night before and looked fine.

I almost gave my "Charlie Brown Blockhead Award" to Winston Harbison for Metcalfe County. Late in the game, he was whistled for a foul, and he mouthed off to the official, who promptly gave him a technical. I could see the frustration on Harbison's face, so I forgave him. I saw a competitor who doesn't like to lose when he came over to the bench.

The technical foul had no effect on the game except to change the margin of victory. It gave the Raiders a bunch of points near the end of the game, and it took any life left in the Hornets.

Even though the lost, I'm still high on this Metcalfe County squad. The Hornet seniors played on their team that made it to the regional final two years ago (that's off the top of my head, so I hope I'm right), and they play very well together. In the wide open Fourth, several teams have a shot at going to the Sweet Sixteen, but I think Metcalfe has the best chance.

OBSERVATIONS

Yecccch!: Hey, Warren East! Clean your dang bleachers. I started to think that they purposely poured Coca-Cola all over the visitor's bleachers. It reminded me of going to the 99 cent movies at the old Bowling Green Mall when I was in college. I left my shoes in the garage when I got home last night. I've stepped in less nasty stuff at the Kentucky State Fair.

Twin Towers: Forget Bowie and Turpin or Robinson and Duncan. Metcalfe County has Grant and Russell Kindred. I don't know their heights, but they are actually twins. I list their heights at "tall" and be done with it.

Brothers in Arms?: I noticed that the Metcalfe County Roster features three kids with the last name "Shirley." I saw Patrick and Latrel Shirley on Saturday night, and I'm going to take a wild guess that they are not brothers by relation. I'm also going to guess that one of them may be the brother of missing Trey Shirley.

A Proud Tradition: Warren East has a great basketball tradition. They've won 9 Fourth Region championships, and they made it to the state semi-finals in 1997. With guys like DeAngelo Kirk, Jordan Ellis, and Shenard Holton on their squad, they have a real good chance of winning "one for the other thumb." If Russell Malone can get them to play defense without fouling, they could make it past the first week of March.

Chattering Players: I've noticed it in both baseball and basketball in recent years. Players no longer chatter. They don't even squawk to let a teammate know that they're open. Everyone gripes about trash-talking players these days, but I see it exactly opposite. When I was in high school players chattered all the time on the field and on the court. I remember Central High School's players like they were an entire team of Meadowlark Lemons. None of it was mean and a lot of it was funny. Metcalfe County's players walk on and off the court like they're filing into a Sunday School class.