In school’s second year, Great Crossing girls playing winning basketball at torrid pace
Great Crossing’s Braylee McMath says playing Scott County is just like any other game to her and her Warhawks teammates despite the fact the rival programs are the result of a school district split into two high schools two years ago.
“A lot of my game came from there playing with a lot of older players who are now playing big-time college basketball,” McMath said Friday night after Great Crossing’s 61-51 victory. “A lot of my maturity and leadership came from there playing under them. I have a lot of respect for their team.
“But it also feels good to get a win on the other side.”
McMath led Great Crossing with 22 points, five rebounds, five assists and two steals. But the 5-foot senior dynamo might have been most stoked about her second-half block of a Scott County three-pointer.
“First one of the season!” she said, laughing. “It felt pretty good, but it hyped me up way too much. It probably will never happen again.”
A good-sized COVID-19 restricted home crowd at Great Crossing High School appreciated the moment, and McMath even posed a little as the ball was retrieved from out of bounds. She wasn’t worried about possibly drawing a technical, though.
“When you’re 5-foot tall and you get a block, you’ve got to celebrate at least once,” she said.
Talent split
The game marked the first win for the Warhawks over Scott County after two regular-season blowout defeats and a 10-point playoff loss to the Cardinals a year ago in Great Crossing’s inaugural 16-16 campaign.
While Scott County (3-6), an 11th Region power for years, has been struggling in 2021, Great Crossing (6-1) has found its stride, playing roughly the same run-and-gun offense Coach Glenn Wilson ran as an assistant coach under Scott County’s Steve Helton for 20 years. The Warhawks average about 71 points per game.
“It’s pretty much the same stuff,” Wilson acknowledged. “I was the freshman coach, so I got to work with all these girls when they were younger. So, when we came over here, we just continued the same thing.
“I would love to have a big beast inside where we could work it inside out, but we don’t have that. We have to rely on our quickness, and we have kids who can shoot the ball. So that’s how we’ve been doing it: Get up and down and go.”
Wilson admitted he initially wasn’t crazy about the district splitting into two schools, knowing, athletically, the single school helped the Cardinals be more competitive on the playing fields. Now, as he’s seeing his team mature and the county keep growing, he believes the programs will survive the growing pains and thrive.
“We’ve got a lot of young talent that came over here last year. We didn’t have any seniors at all, but we got some good players in each class,” Wilson said.
One of those was McMath, a Division II Christian Brothers University commit who Wilson calls a general on the court.
“Moving over here, I knew I had to step up and be a leader. That just kind of comes with it,” McMath said.
Before Friday’s game, McMath received a commemorative “1,000th Point” basketball, a scoring mark she set as both a Cardinals and a Warhawks varsity player.
“I don’t know what we’re going to do without her,” Wilson said. “She makes so many things happen. She can guard the ball. She’s quick … . She can score. And she’s grown so much. I’ve coached her ever since she was in seventh grade and to see how much she’s grown, even from last year to this year — she’s like, ‘Coach, I’ve got this.’”
Great start
McMath helped Great Crossing seize the initiative from the outset against Scott County Friday and looked much more comfortable at the sprinter’s pace in the first period. The Warhawks outscored Scott County 24-11 in the first thanks to some early hot shooting that included two McMath three-pointers.
But as the game wore on, it became clear the Warhawks missed two of their standout players — Timothi Williams, the team’s second leading scorer, and Raegan Barrett. Each had one more day of COVID-19 quarantine to observe before rejoining the team.
The entire team had been in a 10-day quarantine until the majority resumed play on Tuesday. Playing the way Great Crossing wants to became difficult against the Cardinals.
“You don’t think that it’s a hard thing to get over, but even myself, I was a little winded,” McMath said. “You can’t just come back from 10 days (off), have two practices and be back in shape, but we’ll figure that out.”
Great Crossing’s shooting cooled considerably and Scott County was able to keep in contact the rest of the game, cutting the lead to as few as six points in the fourth period.
“I knew they were going to give it 100 percent,” McMath said of the Cardinals. “As much as we wanted to beat them, they wanted to beat us. ... We had a few immature mistakes, but I thought we closed out pretty well.”
Great Crossing was scheduled to have Williams and Barrett back in the lineup Saturday for their game against Danville, a last-minute replacement for a COVID-19 canceled Lexington Catholic matchup. They got 14 points from Rachel Smith and nine and eight points, respectively, from Ava Schureman and Lauren Tucker.
In the 41st District, Great Crossing has a good shot to earn its way to the 11th Region Tournament. District rival Franklin County, the region’s preseason favorite, defeated Great Crossing 67-52 on Jan. 15, but the Warhawks already have victories against their other district foes, Frankfort and Western Hills. All district tournament finalists earn bids to the regional.
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