Story and photo by Mark Carpenter –
As they did so often in the regular season, Coach John Kennedy and his eighth grade girls from Manchester Junior High destroyed another opponent in their first action in the Southern Hills Athletic Conference Tournament.
On Feb.8, on the floor of Whiteoak High School, the Lady Hounds, the number two seed in the tourney, battled the West Union Dragons and it was no contest from the beginning. Manchester jumped out to a 12-2 lead after one quarter and increased that to 30-6 at the half with a big 18-point second quarter on offense.
The Lady Hounds tossed in 16 more in the third stanza and finished the game with 10 more in the fourth, accounting for their 56 in the big win.
The stats for the game were all in the favor of the winners, as they held the Lady Dragons to just four field goals in the game and forced 27 West Union turnovers. Manchester scored a whopping 38 points in the paint, compared to just 4 for West Union.
The victorious Lady Hounds placed two players in double figures, led by 16 points from Brooke Kennedy, with Sydnie Cox adding 10. Both players also had double-double efforts with Kennedy hauling down 10 rebounds and Cox 11.
Karigan Turner added 9 points for the Lady Hounds, with Emily Sweeney scoring 6 and Abby Young 5.
Manchester now moves on to the semi-finals of the SHAC Tournament and they will be looking to move to the title game when they face the Peebles Lady Indians on Saturday, Feb. 11 at 7 p.m at Ripley High School. The winner of that contest will play for the SHAC championship on Feb. 15 at 7:30 p.m. at Manchester.
