Tigers get off to 2-0 start while looking forward to practice
JON DYKSTRA/THE FORUM
Worth County freshman Hayden Sanders makes a pass on Tuesday night in Ravenwood.
GRANT CITY, Mo. — The Worth County boys basketball team has twice as many wins as they have had practices this season.
With a 65-25 win at Northeast Nodaway, the Tigers improved to 2-0 this season despite a Sunday practice being the only practice of the season for the state football runners-up who didn’t see that season end until last Thursday.
The Tigers didn’t appear to have much rust on Tuesday night as the first 12 points of the night came from beyond the 3-point arc and Worth County eventually built a 16-0 lead.
“We shot pretty well when we first came out,” Worth County coach Les New said. “They played 2-3 zone so they allowed us to shoot and we shot well. And when we did miss there for a while, we got a lot of offensive boards and had a lot of opportunities to shoot the ball.”
A pair of foul shots from Bluejay senior Jack Boswell briefly halted the run for the road squad, but the Tigers got right back after it with another 12-0 run. The star of the second run to make it 28-2 was one of the less hyped freshmen because he isn’t the sibling of a current All-State player.
Cole Ruby isn’t a starter yet, but the freshman is beginning to show what he can provide off the bench in terms of instant offense. Ruby had 8-straight points including two 3-pointers in the first quarter on Tuesday as the lead settled at 30-4 going into the second quarter.
“It feels good,” Ruby said. “I’ve got big shoes to fill coming in, so it feels good.”
The second quarter saw Ruby score the final five points for Worth County and they took a 44-10 lead into halftime. Ruby and the seven other freshmen on the team have been going through the same things with the sudden start to the basketball season, coming off football.
“We are a big family,” Ruby said. “We like it.”
The game was no longer in doubt after halftime, but what was in doubt was the individual competition between the two post players — Northeast Nodaway’s Grant McIntyre and Worth County’s Bo Collins. The two friends and starting ends on the coop’s football team had a bet with each other on who would score more points on Tuesday.
McIntyre scored the first six points of his varsity career in the first half and had the edge over Collins 6-2 at halftime. Collins came back with seven third-quarter points for a 9-6 advantage going into the fourth quarter.
With the game decided, Collins didn’t play in the fourth quarter and McIntyre took advantage with four points in the running-clock quarter to win the bet.
McIntyre had 10 points to lead the Bluejays while Boswell had seven, Brycen Kennard had six and Reese Gray had two.
“We went down early, but the boys stayed with it,” Northeast Nodaway coach Mitchell Sherry said. “… I saw 100 percent effort and I saw them working a lot better as a full team tonight.”
For the Tigers, Tyler New had 17 points, Ruby had 16 and Caleb New had 11. Collins finished with nine, Cannon Fletcher had six, Ethan Lininger had four and Karson Briner had two.
“Everybody got in and got to play,” Les New said. “Cole — last night he had three points and tonight he had 16. That is kinda how I want this team to be. Every night, it might be different as far as our scoring, but as long as we can have three or four in double figures and everyone willing to shoot and everyone understanding that when we do shoot to crash the boards and not care who shoots as long as they are good shots.”
Worth County will host King City on Friday and Northeast Nodaway will host Stanberry on Thursday.
“I tell them if you give me 100 percent and do what I ask, I am never going to be mad at you,” Sherry said. “That is what they are doing.”
