By Dan Weber NKyTribune sports reporter
Forget the thought for this week. It was way too neat, too simple.
With all four top Ninth Region basketball teams playing one another this week, the assumption was that we’d know who to pick as the favorite in three weeks when all these one-loss-in-the-region teams – each from a different district – would sort themselves out in advance of the actual Ninth Region tourney.
Not a chance.
“They’re all beatable,” said Newport Coach Rod Snapp, including his own 25-3 Wildcats in that “they,” despite a 48-42 win over a Cooper team with two of their best – maybe their two best – players out for this slugfest in front of a fired-up crowd in Union Tuesday.
Newport’s best player – sophomore guard Taylen Kinney – was not out, however. Without him and his 28 points, the top-ranked Wildcats — who totaled just 20 more points among them — would not have walked away with their 17th straight win here, not against a Jaguar team with role players getting a chance to stand in for the stars.
Junior guard and fiery leader Yamil Rondon, out for two weeks with a slightly separated right shoulder, and 6-4 shooter Andy Johnson, who was averaging 25 points a game the first two games of the season before fracturing his left wrist, were the first two Jaguars on the bench, coaching their teammates up as best they could.
“Those kids getting the extra minutes, they’re possessed,” Snapp said of the way Tim Sullivan’s crew just manages to find a way to deny you an opportunity to run your offense, “ultra-possessed,” he said. “Cooper’s a different animal.”
Indeed. But then so too is Kinney, playing at a different level, especially in a 16-point first quarter that had the Wildcats up 24-7 and this game apparently over. Or in the final 3:47 when he scored Newport’s last eight straight points.
Do the math and that’s 24 points for Kinney in under 12 minutes when the Wildcats really needed him. But after that first quarter, Cooper had a vote here and the Jaguars decided this one wasn’t over as they outscored Newport, 35-24 the final three quarters. If their top offensive guys weren’t available, they’d just have to do it with defense.
Which is exactly what Cooper did, starting with holding a Newport team that ripped them for 24 points in the first quarter to just three in the second. There were more Wildcats hitting the floor and breaks in play to wipe the blood off the court than field goals for a while there.
For the game, Newport had just two assists to Cooper’s eight, and seven turnovers to the Jags’ nine with 30 rebounds to Cooper’s 26. Nothing came easy.
“They’re going to be really good with ‘Meel and Andy,” Kinney said of the full Cooper team that will be here for the postseason. “They and CovCath, I’d like to see ‘em both,” he said of the potential matchups. “We’re all family. I like ‘em all.”
Which would include the fourth of the top teams – Lloyd Memorial – which will be at Newport Thursday in the week’s final round-robin game.
“We knew what we were getting into,” Snapp said of this game, no matter who was or wasn’t available for Cooper. Everyone who was available played like the teams Newport has been playing all year. “We play good teams,” Snapp said.
Which is how Newport survived here, with Cooper’s 6-6 senior Shaun Pouncy playing like the big man he is with 19 points, many with his left hand down low, and six rebounds with four fouls against Newport’s two front-liners – 6-7 sophomore James Turner and 6-8 freshman Griffin Starks.
As the game went on, Turner was turned into something of a pinata, hitting the floor and banging up his back once, getting cut down at midcourt another time while having to have his bloody nose attended to twice.
“That wasn’t an easy game to officiate,” Snapp said. Or to play in.
But do we know any more about who to pick for the region? Nope. Not a hint here. Stay tuned.
CovCath has beaten Newport. And Lloyd. Cooper beat CovCath. Newport beat Cooper with Lloyd coming up. And Lloyd’s come really close to Cooper and CovCath.
And now Cooper, losing for the first time after eight straight wins, has a cast of tough characters led by Jaiden Combs who have shown they can step up to the challenges that come their way. But then so has Newport.
SCORING SUMMARY
NEWPORT 24 3 9 12-48
COOPER 7 14 8 13—42
NEWPORT (25-3, 12-1 in Ninth Region): Kinney 5-10 3-5 9-11 28, Jackson 4-11 0-0 0-0 8, Covington 2-4 1-4 7, Turner 1-3 0-0 3-4 5, Silverton 0-0 0-1 0-0 0, Starks 0-3 0-2 0-0 0, Anderson 0-0 0-0 0-0 0; TOTALS: 16-43 4-12 12-15 48.
COOPER (17-8, 8-2 in Ninth Region): Blackburn 1-3 1-3 0-0 3, Brown 1-4 0-3 1-1 3, Combs 3-8 0-0 1-2 7, Rodriguez 2-4 0-1 0-0 4, Murphy 0-2 0-2 0-0 0, I. Johnson 1-4 0-1 2-2 4, Alexander 1-4 0-0 0-0 2, Pouncy 8-14 0-0 3-5 19; TOTALS: 17-43 2-8 6-9 42.
Contact Dan Weber at dweber3440@aol.com. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) @dweber3440.