It’s been a tough start to the season for the Dexter Bearcat Basketball Team. Fans, coaches, and players knew they would be coming into a tough season, as the beginning of their schedule is always very competitive.

Dexter has taken the losses and got back on the court for practices, and shortly turned things around.

The annual Bloomfield Christmas Tournament is something that players and fans look forward to each year. Although the regular season schedule was tough in the beginning, the Bearcats had hoped to show off their hard work throughout the tournament.

Unfortunately for the Bearcats, the Christmas Tournament came to an end rather quickly for the team who is experiencing quite the rebuilding year.

The first round of the Christmas Tournament, the Bearcats took on Twin Rivers. The Bearcats came out strong and ready to win, but Twin Rivers’ offense was too much for the Bearcats to stop. Twin Rivers had a lead over the Bearcats, but Dexter quickly turned things around in the beginning of the fourth quarter. The Bearcats were shooting well, but it was a little too late. Twin Rivers ended with a win of 62-56 over Dexter.

Although many fans and the players were upset to not be in the second round of the tournament, but yet playing in the consolation bracket, the team knew today they would need to step up their game and claim a victory over the Puxico Indians.

After seeing the Indians step it up yesterday and come close to beating South Pemiscot, the Bearcats knew it would be a good match up.

Puxico had a lead over Dexter throughout most of the game, but the Bearcats never let the lead get too out of hand. Dexter was struggling to come up with little shots under the goal throughout the first half of the game. At the beginning of the third quarter, things really turned around for the Bearcats, and the hope of the fans had returned.

Dexter played very hard the last two quarters with lots of aggression and a few players started feeling more confident in shooting the ball. Both Joyner and Miller for the Bearcats fouled out before the end of the game, but sophomore Austin Aldridge stepped up to fill their shoes.

At the very end of the 4^th quarter, the Bearcats were down by two points and had 1.6 seconds left to make their move. It was obvious that a shot needed to be taken in order to at least tie it up and roll over into overtime, but none of the Bearcat players could get in position for a shot.

Puxico ended up posting a 59-57 victory over the Bearcats.

Written  by
Dee Loflin, SMT Writer

Bloomfield, Missouri - The only upset so far in the Bloomfield Christmas Tournament was between #9 seeded Bloomfield Wildcats and #8 seeded Malden and it ended in overtime.

Bloomfield’s Brett Ruch drove to the basket in the final 5 seconds in overtime to make the game-winning lay-up and win 58-56 against Malden.  Jason Karnes said, “That’s kind of what we wanted to do.  We had a couple of shooters out there that were in the right spots at the right times.  We were just lucky enough to catch the ball and make the play.  It worked out well for us.”

It was a tuff match up, Malden did not score the final two minutes in overtime and Bloomfield was able to take advantage by scoring its overtime points in the final 46 seconds.  “Every defense we played tonight worked for us to some extent.  I thought defensively we did a fairly good job keeping them in front of us and contesting jump shots.” Stated Coach Karnes.

“Our guys just kept battling!”  Karnes continued.  “Those first three minutes of overtime were crazy!”  “We are going to play against a good team on Friday night.  Kennett is something real special for us and we are going to try as hard as we can to compete against them.  Should be an exciting match up.”

Bloomfield’s Caleb Baker led the team in scoring with 17 points followed by Austin Williams and Brett Ruch both with 10 points each.  Caleb Baker and Zac Good both made 3 pointers during the game.  Malden’s largest lead was six in the first quarter and Bloomfield’s largest lead was by seven in the third quarter.    

Bloomfield  11,  18,  13,  10   Overtime 6    Total 58

Malden       15,  13,  11,  13   Overtime 4     Total 56

Final Score Bloomfield 58 Malden 56 in overtime.

Written  by
Dee Loflin, SMT Writer

Bloomfield, Missouri - The Richland Rebels were no match for the Kennett Indians in the opening game of the Bloomfield Christmas Tournament.

Nine of the eleven Indian players listed on the Kennett roster made baskets.  Six Indian players were in double digit numbers.  The offensive weapons of the Kennett Indians just outscored the Rebels by double digits in three of the four quarters.

With a win over the Rebels, the Kennett Indians advance to the quarterfinals for a fourth straight season.  Congratulations to the Kennett High School athletics.  “It is good we were able to spread it out a little bit,”  Kennett coach Jim Vaughan said.  “We scored quite a lot off of transition and defense.  To win this type of tournament you have to have different guys step up.”

The Kennett Indians were 15 of 24 from the free-throw-line and Richland shot 7 of 11 at the free-throw-line.  Kennett went on to score 36 total 2-pointers, but neither team recorded any 3-pointers in the game.

Vaughan stated, “We gave up two baskets right away to start the second quarter.  We provided a lot more defensive energy after that and held their offense down the rest of the half.”  Kennett led the game 23 – 14 with over six minutes remaining in the first half before a 22-0 run pushed the lead to 45-14.

Kevonte Mitchell rallied a team high of 23 points for Kennett with Harold Weeden adding 13 more.  Akeem Nelson, Antonio Primer, Antavies Drake and Cameron Harper also scored 10 points each.

Kennett (6-3) will play its quarterfinal contest Friday at 4 pm against #9 Bloomfield.

Final score Kennett Indians 87 – Richland Rebels 39