GIRLS’, BOYS’ PRESEASON HOOPS PICKS
Northern Kentucky girls’ basketball teams fare pretty well in the Cats’ Pause Magazine’s preseason basketball rankings with Simon Kenton No. 1 in the Eighth Region with Walton-Verona No. 6. In the 10th Region, Campbell County and Bishop Brossart are Nos. 3-4 respectively with Scott No. 6. And in the Ninth Region, it’s Cooper, Ryle, Holy Cross, Highlands and Notre Dame Nos. 1-5 with Conner, St. Henry, Dixie Heights, Lloyd Memorial and Newport Central Catholic Nos. 6-10.
In their boys’ rankings, the Cats’ Pause has Walton-Verona No. 4 and Simon Kenton No. 7 in the Eighth Region, while in the 10th Region, Campbell County is No. 4 and Scott No. 7. The Ninth Region shows Covington Catholic a bit of a surprise No. 1 over defending region champs Newport at No. 2. Cooper, Highlands and Lloyd Memorial round out the top five in that order with Nos. 6-10 St. Henry, Ryle, Conner, NewCath and Boone County finishing out the Top 10 in that order.
That’s not how high school basketball blogger Patrick Wooley sees it with his preseason state rankings showing Coach Rod Snapp’s Newport team No. 2 in Kentucky, behind only the Lyon County team that knocked the young Wildcats out in their Sweet 16 debut last March. He has Cooper No. 8, Lloyd No. 15, Covington Catholic No. 19 and Walton-Verona No. 24.
On the girls’ side, the Courier-Journal Coaches Poll has a Liz Freihofer-led Cooper at No. 4 in the state preseason rankings followed by cross-town rival Ryle (led by Quinn Eubank and Sarah Baker) at No. 11 and defending All “A” Classic champs Holy Cross (led by Julia Hunt) at No. 24.
SALUTING AN NFL FIRST FOR COVCATH’S MAYER
CovCath, and Notre Dame, alum Michael Mayer scored his first NFL touchdown as a tight end for the Las Vegas Raiders last weekend when he showed his high school basketball hops in going up and over to catch the game-winning seven-yard fourth-quarter TD, the game’s lone touchdown and one of his three catches in the game, in the 5-5 Raiders’ 16-12 win over the New York Jets.
DIVERSE GROUP OF NOVEMBER INDUCTEES FOR N. KY. SPORTS HALL OF FAME
They come from five different sports and completely different eras, but with a Covington Holmes’ slant for this month’s Northern Kentucky Sports Hall of Fame Wednesday at 1 p.m. at The Gardens in Park Hills. The public is welcome and there is no charge.
• Woody Cottengim was a three-year starter in football as a fullback graduating in 1965, earning an offer from Eastern Kentucky, and a three-year track letterman now in the Covington Public Schools Athletics Hall of Fame. He would go on to coach pee wee football and Knothole baseball while helping Holmes’ AD Ron Madrick start the Tom Ellis Golf Classic.
• Rob Hardin starred in the legendary Bellevue High School tennis program for legendary coach Roger Klein, graduating in 1974 before following his coach to NKU for college. He would also follow his old coach into coaching himself, at Bellevue from 1991-1996, and then at Notre Dame Academy for the next 25 years with a 226-41 record while winning three state championships with two state runners-up. He is a member of both the Athletic Directors’ and Notre Dame Halls of Fame.
• Saint Henry’s Amy Franks Garner led the Crusaders in soccer, basketball and track before graduating in 1999 and moving on to Wright State as an all-state Kentucky soccer star who would lead the Raiders as an all-conference and all-Ohio player. At Saint Henry, she helped the Crusaders to a state title in track and field while winning two individual and two relay state championships and is now a member of the school’s Hall of Fame.
• Like his classmate Cottengim, Tom Hicks graduated from Holmes in 1965 as a three-year basketball letterman where he played for a pair of legendary coaches in Tom Ellis and Reynolds Flynn, averaging 14 points a game as a senior having helped the Bulldogs to NKAC titles in 1964 and 1965, earning all-conference honors as a senior. He would go on to join the Marines and spend 13 months in Vietnam.
• And finally, we go back more than a century for one of the more illustrious and historic inductees ever in jockey Mack Garner, whose racing career started at the age of 14 in Butte, Montana, back in 1914. But Garner, a Centerville, Iowa, native didn’t stay there, eventually marrying and settling down in Covington where his children attended Holmes High School. By 1915, he was the nation’s winningest jockey with wins in the Travers Stakes, the Latonia Cup and the Spinaway Stakes. By 1923, he was declared the “world’s greatest jockey” and again in 1929, led the nation in jockey earnings.
He would win the 1934 Kentucky Derby on Cavalcade, the 1929 Belmont Stakes with Blue Larkspur and the 1933 Belmont with Hurry Off. Before his death from heart failure in 1936 after a day when he rode in four races at River Downs, he’d won 46 stakes races including the 1921 Spinaway Stakes, 1920 and 1922 Ben Ali, the 1923, 1924 and 1925 Latonia Championship Stakes, the 1925 and 1926 Derby Trials and the 1929 Wood Memorial. Mack Garner is buried in Covington’s Linden Grove Cemetery.
Contact Dan Weber at dweber3440@aol.com. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) @dweber3440.