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BASKETBALL: Herrin halts Panthers' win streak

Posted December 19, 2011 10:00 pm

Doug Daniels

</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Pinckneyville led 13-6 six minutes into Saturday night's boys varsity basketball contest at Herrin, but the Tigers fought back with a 16-3 run at the end of the first half and start of the third quarter to distance themselves from the Panthers, going on to win 54-42.

"We never had a starting rotation in the game for more than four minutes," said PCHS head coach Bob Waggoner. "When you look at when we had our starting five in there, and when we could keep our top six in the game, we were right there with them. When you get in foul trouble and you don't play well defensively, and you have to sub in more and more with your rotation, sometimes against a better team it's going to cost you."

Hunter Queen had two three-pointers and Dylan Hardin added a third for the Panthers, who led 13-6 after Payton Nippe's bucket with 2:17 to go in the opening quarter of play.

The Tigers began to claw back right away, closing the gap to two by the end of the period and jumping ahead 16-13 on Bobby Mannie's corner three with 6:53 left in the half. Herrin still led by three, 30-27, at the break after stick-backs by Mannie and Dashaun Hart to end the second quarter.

The Tigers' run spilled over into the second half as the Panthers struggled for just one field goal and two free throws in the entire third period while Herrin kept finding ways to score and keep Pinckneyville in foul trouble throughout the evening.

That foul trouble finally caught up with the visiting Panthers in the fourth quarter as the Tigers went to the line for 18 free throws in the period and a total of 35 attempts in the game.

"Give them credit, they were the more aggressive team," Waggoner said. "When you're the more aggressive team you're going to get fouled."

"I thought tonight we played a little bit intimidated against a team that's a little more athletic and really pressured us. There's one of two things you can do, you can either match that intensity and be aggressive and get fouled, or you can play side-to-side and we did a lot of playing side-to-side tonight."

The Panthers got no closer than down nine in the fourth quarter as Herrin handed them their first loss of the season. The total foul count for the game had Pinckneyville whistled for 28 personals and the Tigers 18. Nippe, Justin Bumann and Bryant Shute all fouled out for PCHS.

"I think there was some frustration," Waggoner said. "It's the first time we've been in that situation this year. It's a good learning experience, but I sat there and looked at the score and at the same time we were still in the ball game. We were playing so poor it just makes you wonder what could have happened if we would have played a little bit more intelligently and kept our guys in the game."

Queen led the Panthers (5-1) with 14 points, Nippe added 8, Hardin had 6. Also scoring for Pinckneyville were C.J. Opp (4 points), Chris Priebe (4), Keegan Kellerman (2), Luke Miller (2) and Bumann (2). Mannie led the Tigers with 22 points, Nathan Lukens chipped in 12.

After narrowly escaping with a 43-42 win at Anna the night before, the junior varsity Panthers (5-1) also tasted defeat for the first time against Herrin falling 43-40.

<u>Panthers pour it on at A-J</u>

On Friday night, Pinckneyville improved to 2-0 in the Southern Illinois River-to-River Conference Mississippi Division with a 68-35 road win at Anna behind 14 points from Priebe.

The Panthers jumped ahead 7-0 off of four Wildcat turnovers before A-J finally got on the board with 4:45 to go in the first quarter. The Panthers led 19-6 after one and scored the first five points of the second period on a bucket from Priebe and a three-pointer from Queen.

The Wildcats were never in it from that point on, allowing 11 different Panthers to enter the scorebook in the points column.

"First credit goes to our kids for following through on the scouting report, the other credit goes to Coach (Nolan) Kellerman for getting together on the scouting report," said Waggoner. "He had Anna well-documented on what we needed to do and had them scouted out really well. Our kids followed it through to a tee, we really pushed the ball at them in transition and didn't give them a chance to set up their zone."

Queen joined Priebe in double figures with 13 points, Opp had 8, Nippe and Shute each added 7, Hardin, Miller and Devan Downard each with 4, Kellerman 3, and Caleb Dahn and Chase Lazenby 2.

Travis Smith led Anna (3-4, 0-2) with 8 points.

Pinckneyville returns to the floor this Friday at Nashville for another conference road test.

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