All ‘A’ champs shine on Kentucky’s biggest stage in knocking out state’s biggest star
READ MORE
2022 Boys’ Sweet 16 coverage
Click below to read all of the coverage from Kentucky.com and the Lexington Herald-Leader during the Boys’ Sweet 16 State Basketball Tournament in Rupp Arena.
Expand All
Pikeville, the All “A” Classic champions in town to try to pull off a rare state title sweep, proved they were nobody’s underdog going against North Laurel and its heralded University of Kentucky commit Reed Sheppard on Wednesday night.
An 18-0 first-half run sparked by a tenacious defense and the hot shooting of point guard Keian Worrix and forward Rylee Samons put Pikeville in control early in their first-round game of the UK HealthCare Boys’ Sweet 16 State Basketball Tournament.
The Panthers’ ability to answer North Laurel’s runs with spurts of their own in the second half helped Pikeville get the 59-51 victory in front of a crowd that was announced at 12,206 for an evening session that included Clark County’s win over Perry County Central.
“Once you get started and you’re already hot, you’re thinking nobody can really stop you at that point,” said Worrix who finished with six assists and scored 10 of his 12 points in the first half, including a pair of three-pointers in the 18-0 run. “And then that just continues throughout the whole game and you have that confidence throughout the whole game.”
The Panthers defense frustrated Sheppard and his teammates. The four-star junior who averages 25.5 points per game was held to 14 points against a team that could switch any of its five players onto him and usually kept someone ready in the paint to cut off his favorite spots. Sheppard made only five of his 20 shots and was 1-for-3 from three-point range.
“They always had a dude in the paint waiting on me, so there were always two to three dudes on me,” Sheppard said. “That just made it tough to get to my spots and get to my mid-range shot. Unfortunately, they just weren’t falling tonight.”
Meanwhile, Pikeville’s Samons had sequences where he couldn’t miss. During a stretch in the third quarter after North Laurel opened the half with a three-pointer to get their deficit back to 25-23, Samons hit back-to-back three pointers, then got a layup and a block as part of a 13-0 run capped by Laithan Hall’s three-pointer to push the lead back to double digits at 38-23 with 5:10 left in the third.
“That’s what we said we wanted to do — go on a run and then make them call a timeout or two, and then come back out and go on another run,” Hall said.
Ryan Davidson led the Jaguars (28-7) with 23 points and had 11 rebounds to go with Sheppard’s 14 points, eight rebounds, five assists and six steals. North Laurel came in as the No. 3 scoring team in the state at 79 points per game. Pikeville (32-2) held them to 51 on 36.4 percent shooting.
“Obviously, not the outcome that we wanted,” North Laurel Coach Nate Valentine said. “I feel like that was probably one of the poorest games that we played all season long, but I think Pikeville had a lot to do with that. When you don’t make shots early … it makes everything really tough.”
Pikeville Coach Elisha Justice admitted he felt his team was perceived as an underdog going into the game. He didn’t feel that way.
“This is a team that I battled with all year 31-2, I believe, coming into this game, and so I know who I’m going to battle with and I know these guys, they’re not scared of nobody,” Justice said.
Next up, Pikeville will face Clark County, the team that has been ranked No. 1 since December and has been throttling opponents, including first-round foe Perry County Central who lost in a running clock 77-36 mercy-rule contest earlier in the evening.
“I’m not a guy that looks ahead, so I’ll just be honest with you, I haven’t seen a whole lot of them,” Justice said of the Cardinals. “I know that they probably are the favorite to win this whole tournament. They’re really athletic and like to play a fast pace. So I think we’re going to have to do a great job of handling their pressure and make sure we get good shots and not falling into what they want us to do.”
This story was originally published March 17, 2022 at 7:47 AM.
