Midland Trail advances with 52-43 conquest of Shady Spring

Feb. 20—HICO — A glance at the scorebook showed that Midland Trail enjoyed a pretty solid shooting night against Shady Spring in a girls Class AAA Region 3, Section 1 basketball tournament opener Monday.

The No. 4 seed Patriots canned six 3-point goals, including five by freshman Raelyn Morris, in dispatching the No. 5 Tigers 52-43 at the Flournoy Center to advance to a semifinal matchup with No. 1 seed PikeView Wednesday at Gardner.

While the Patriots' perimeter shooting was key at times, Shady Spring head coach Tabitha Barnes said it was Trail's lunch-pail approach inside the paint that proved to be her team's undoing. The hosts got "a lot of putbacks," Barnes said. "They were scrappy underneath. They outhustled us a little bit, mostly in that first quarter. I told them at halftime ... yeah, they got a lot of second and third shots. You can't win if you give a team the second and third shot. You've got to get the rebound. That hurt us the most right there."

Midland Trail head coach John Mark Kincaid said his team has progressed and isn't relying solely on exterior shooting, although it turned out to be a boost Monday. "Nevaeh Hall (who was saddled with foul issues before eventually fouling out) and Jayla Barnhouse have really stepped up the past two or three weeks," he said. "They're getting better with handling the ball. You know what I'm saying, we're being more diverse. We're getting four people involved instead of two.

"Both teams shot the ball well. Neither one shot the ball that well the two times before. They (Shady) wanted the ball, they wanted that win as much as we did. They were all over the floor. We was all over the floor. It was a good, scrappy basketball game."

The Tigers, seeking their third straight win and the chance to move on in the postseason, hung tough after Midland Trail rallied from an early deficit to lead 17-10 after one quarter and 30-22 at the halftime break. A 9-2 Shady spurt — capped by a free throw off a drive by Austyn Barnes — left the visitors trailing by just one point, 32-31, at the 5:15 mark of the third period.

The Patriots' outside prowess grabbed the momentum back just as quickly as it had been lost, though. First, Morris buried a 3 from the right wing after fielding a kick-out assist from Jayla Barnhouse, then Rumor Barnhouse took a feed from her cousin, Jayla, and converted a trey of her own, making it 38-31 with 4:10 left in the third.

"They made a couple big threes down there that hurt us," said coach Barnes.

The Tigers later trimmed the deficit back to two, 38-36, on a Kendra Pizzino three and two freebies from Kylee Barnes, but once again the Patriots responded. Morris scored on a putback before converting her fifth 3-pointer of the night, a fast break goal that came as the result of an assist by Rumor Barnhouse and handed the Patriots a 43-36 cushion with eight minutes left.

Shady Spring crept back to within four points, 45-41, on a Kylee Barnes drive after a Trail turnover with a little over three minutes remaining, but the Patriots stepped up and answered one more time. Rumor Barnhouse sank two foul shots (she was 6-of-6 from the charity stripe down the stretch), and Whitney Bibb made 1-of-2 from the line and staked Trail to a 48-41 margin which proved to be too large for Shady Spring to overcome.

"They needed to make a couple of shots themselves, but they were playing hard," Kincaid said. "It really hurt having Nevaeh Hall on the bench. She was playing really well until then." He said the rhythm of the outside tandem of Morris and Rumor Barnhouse clicked at just the right time to keep the Tigers at bay.

"That's when we changed things up," Barnes said of the key point of the third quarter when the Patriots prevented the Tigers from keeping their momentum and perhaps moving into the lead. "I tried to put some girls in, play man-to-man, get 'em out of the rhythm a little bit, so, yeah, we had to change things up. I had some subs in there that weren't getting where they really needed to be."

Morris bucketed a game-high 19 points for the Patriots, while Rumor Barnhouse finished with 17.

Megan Hendrick was active in the lane and led the Tigers (2-17) with 12 points, while teammates Pizzino and Kylee Barnes supplied 10 points each.

Barnes said her team gave her good effort. "Yeah, they played hard, from start to finish. I thought they gave it everything they had."

While having success outside as well as driving into the lane, the work on the glass was indeed a positive factor for the Patriots. For example, with the score at 23-17 in Trail's favor in the second quarter, the Patriots got at least three offensive rebounds on a single possession and Maddie Harrell wound up with a putback to push the lead to 25-17. Later, after the Tigers had pulled to within five, 43-38, early in the fourth period, Midland Trail's Bibb collected an offensive board and converted for a 45-38 lead for her team.

The first half saw the Tigers start strong, going up 8-4 on a two-pointer from Hendrick on a putback. The Patriots took control from there, however, and proceeded on a 13-2 run to lead 17-10 after eight minutes. That spurt featured a pair of 3-point goals from Morris — the latter one coming in transition as the Patriots assumed a 15-10 spread with 30 seconds left in the first period. The lead moved to seven points on a drive in the lane by Rumor Barnhouse as the second quarter approached.

The Tigers got to within four points, 17-13, on a trifecta from Austyn Barnes at the outset of the second, but the hosts ran the lead back to nine points, 28-19, on yet another Morris 3, this one from the right wing.

Midland Trail (8-13) faces PikeView on Wednesday, Feb. 21. The other semifinal Wednesday pits No. 2 Independence against No. 3 Westside at Coal City. The championship game is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 23 at 7 p.m. at the highest remaining seed.

"They spanked us both times (scores of 64-36 and 55-31)," Kincaid said of the Panthers. "I told (his players) if you really don't think we can beat PikeView, don't get on the bus, 'cause we're not going there just to play a game. You've got to have that attitude, have a little chip on your shoulder. We've been involved in a lot of upsets both ways. Getting upset and upsetting, beating people."

Shady Spring (2-17)

Megan Hendrick 6 0-0 12, Austyn Barnes 1 4-8 7, Kendra Pizzino 4 1-2 10, Kylee Barnes 3 2-2 10, Kendall Lilly 1 2-4 4. TOTALS: 15 9-16 43.

Midland Trail (8-13)

Jayla Barnhouse 2 1-2 5, Nevaeh Hall 2 2-2 6, Raelyn Morris 7 0-0 19, Rumor Barnhouse 5 6-6 17, Maddie Harrell 1 0-0 2, Mary McGraw 0 0-0 0, Whitney Bibb 1 1-2 3, Fallon Bragg 0 0-0 0, Makenzie Nuckols 0 0-0 0. TOTALS: 18 10-12 52.

SS 10 12 14 7 — 43

MT 17 13 13 9 — 52

Three-point goals — SS: 4 (A. Barnes, Pizzino, K. Barnes 2); MT: 6 (R. Barnhouse, Morris 5). Fouled out — Hall (MT).