‘This is a game you need to be watching.’ Reed Sheppard, Travis Perry face off in Lexington.
It’s not an exaggeration to say the leading candidates for the next two Kentucky Mr. Basketball awards will face off in Lexington on Saturday. Their teams are pretty good, too.
Kentucky signee Reed Sheppard and defending 13th Region champion North Laurel (8-6) will take on the state’s second all-time leading boys’ basketball scorer, Travis Perry, and defending 2nd Region champion Lyon County (12-4) at 7 p.m. Saturday at Lexington Catholic as part of the Knights’ “Second Chance Shootout” event.
Sheppard, a 6-foot-3 four-star senior, unofficially ranks 11th on the boys’ all-time career scoring list with 3,267 points. Perry, a 6-2 four-star junior and University of Kentucky recruiting target, recently moved up to second all-time on that list with 3,669 points, trailing only Wayland legend Kelly “King” Coleman (4,337).
“If you are a fan of Kentucky basketball, I feel like this is a game you need to be watching,” said UK Sports Network’s Cameron Mills, the former Paul Laurence Dunbar standout who played for two of UK’s national championship teams, including 1998’s Comeback Cats. Mills will be part of the commentary crew Saturday for the pay-per-view stream on PrepSpin.com. “Actually, whether you are a UK fan, a Murray fan, a Morehead fan, an Eastern Kentucky fan, it doesn’t matter — I mean, we are a basketball state.”
Lexington Catholic (14-1), which established itself as an 11th Region favorite by winning its own holiday tournament last week, will face defending 7th Region champion Male (6-7) in the first game of the doubleheader at 5:30 p.m. Male features brothers Jack and Cole Edelen as well as Demetrius White, who all have double-figure scoring averages. LexCath is led by 7-foot Miami (Ohio) commit Reece Potter, senior wing Hudson Sparks and junior point guard Tyler Doyle.
3,000-point club
The last time two of Kentucky’s 3,000-point scorers played against each other would likely have been when Pendleton County’s Dontaie Allen faced Bracken County’s Austin Crawford in 2016 and 2017, but neither player had yet crossed that threshold during those meetings. Only 41 players in Kentucky boys’ high school basketball history have topped 3,000 points for their careers.
To find a meeting between two eventual Mr. Basketballs, the 1988 Sweet 16 championship game between Allan Houston’s Ballard and Richie Farmer’s Clay County comes to mind. Farmer, a junior that year, scored 51 points in that matchup, but the Tigers fell to Ballard’s more balanced team. Houston scored 23 points.
Both Sheppard and Perry have tremendous players around them. Lyon County’s Jack Reddick and Brady Shoulders each average nearly 20 points per game while North Laurel’s Ryan Davidson (17.7 ppg) and Brody Brock (11.4 ppg) mean opponents can’t focus solely on Sheppard.
The Jags have been without powerful junior forward Gavin Chadwell (15.7 ppg) since the fourth game of the season due to a reported minor knee injury. North Laurel has gone 3-6 during a difficult holiday tournament stretch without him. He’s expected to return to action soon.
Big-game experience
As regular-season games go, Lyon County-North Laurel stands out, but since each team has highly celebrated players who have been drawing big crowds for much of their careers, Mills expects them to approach this game like they would any other. After all, both have played for region titles and in the Sweet 16 at Rupp Arena.
“They shouldn’t come out with any added motivation. … I hate the phrase statement game,” Mills said. “Every game should be prepped the same way every single time.”
Gary Ball of the “Scholastic Ball Report” and former Franklin County coach Tony Wise will also be part of the PrepSpin announcing crew for Saturday’s games.
“You’ve got someone who may be the all-time leading scorer (Perry) in Kentucky against maybe one of the best all-around players (Sheppard),” Ball said. “I’m excited. It should be a really good game.”
Second Chance Shootout
Where: Lexington Catholic
5:30 p.m. Saturday: Male (5-7) vs. Lexington Catholic (13-1)
7 p.m. Saturday: Lyon County (12-4) vs. North Laurel (8-6)
Tickets: $10 at the door. Available in advance online at https://bit.ly/3vych3W
Streaming: Live via pay per view at Go.PrepSpin.com.
This story was originally published January 5, 2023 at 6:50 AM.
