
Manchester’s Braylan Roberts pushes the ball up from the backcourt in action from the Hounds’ match up with Western Latham at the January 18 Coach Young Classic. Roberts led the Hounds with 13 points as they fell to the Indians. (Photo by Mark Carpenter)
Manchester slips to 5-8 for season
By Mark Carpenter
People’s Defender
Times have been tough recently for Coach Austin Kingsolver and his Manchester Greyhounds and it didn’t improve much as the Hounds traveled to North Adams High School on January 18 to participate in one of the eight games slated for the 2025 Coach Young Classic. The previous night the Hounds had suffered a 49-33 conference loss and had a quick turnaround for a 2:30 p.m. tip off on Saturday, matched up with the Western Latham Indians.
The Greyhounds came into Saturday’s contest losers of four of their last five outings, averaging just 44 points a game in that 1-4 stretch. Putting the ball through the hoop is quite a key to winning basketball games and the Hounds have certainly been struggling with that aspect of the game, and unfortunately for them and their followers, the trend continued on Saturday afternoon as they could muster only 38 points as the Indians broke open a close game in the second half and handed Manchester a 58-38 defeat, dropping the Hounds to 5-8 in a disappointing season thus far.
“Western is really, really good,” said Coach Kingsolver in his postgame radio interview. “They guard you the length of the floor for 32 minutes and that’s hard on anybody, especially playing back-to-back. We have struggled over the last month or so putting the ball in the hoop and it’s simple, if you score more points than the other team, you win the game. Hopefully we get that figured out by the time tournament time rolls around.”
“I thought defensively as a team we played pretty well against their top scorers but their role player knocked down some shots and we just didn’t score. Our role players, like Braylon Rickett and Ronnie Elam, gave us good minutes and they both play hard. We played well early in the season and lost a couple of games that we probably shouldn’t have lost and that kind of took the wind out of us and we’ve struggled to recover.”
The battle with Western began well for the Hounds, a quick 4-0 lead on back-to-back baseline drives and scores by Braylan Roberts. The Indians got off the mat with a 7-0 run before a bucket by the Hounds’ Braylon Rickett tied the score at seven. After a Western score, the first quarter ended with a game-tying basket by Manchester’s Leland Horner and the first eight minutes closed all even.
The Indians tallied the first five points of the second frame, getting a three-point bucket from freshman Landen Owens. The Greyhounds answered with a reverse layup from Parker Hayslip and a short jumper from Elijah Crabtree. An offensive rebound and score tied the game at 15 but a pair of three-pointers by Western’s Kam Janes propelled his team to a 21-16 halftime advantage.
That end of the first half deficit proved to be more than the Greyhounds could ever overcome as the Indians continued to steadily add to their lead through the third quarter, as the Hounds struggled to score once again. A Roberts three-point play at the 4:40 mark kept the Greyhounds within 27-23 but a three-ball from the Indians’ Sam Cattaneo and a steal and score from Drew Haggy stretched their lead out to 32-25. After a Manchester free throw, Western went on another 7-0 run, pushing their advantage to double digits at 39-26 and a basket by the Hounds’ Roberts ended the third quarter with the Indians up 39-28.
With 3:55 to play, a basket by Horner pulled Manchester within 44-36, but from that point forward, it was all Indians. Western swiped away any Greyhound comeback hopes with a huge 12 -1 run over a span of three minutes to open up an insurmountable 56-37 lead. The final Greyhound point of the afternoon came on a Roberts free throw with 1:07 to play as the Hounds dropped their third game of the week, falling by the final count of 58-38.
The victorious Indians were led in scoring by 17 points from senior Kam Janes, with classmates Sam Cattaneo adding 12 and 9 respectively.
For the Hounds, it was senior Braylan Roberts leading the way with 13 points with senior Leland Horner scoring 8 and junior Braylon Rickett 7.
Looking to get back on a winning track, the Greyhounds hosted the Felicity Cardinals in a non-conference tussle and get back into Southern Hills Athletic Conference action on Friday with a trip to Ripley, followed up by another non-conference outing on Saturday, hosting the Portsmouth West Senators on Senior Night.
W. Latham
9 12 18 19 —58
Manchester
9 7 12 10 —38
W. Latham (58): Kersn 0 0-2 0, Cattaneo 5 0-0 12, Haggy 1 3-4 5, Owens 3 0-0 9, Janes 7 1-3 17, Siliven 2 0-0 4, Riggs 2 5-6 9, Davis 1 0-0 2, Team 21 9-15n58.
Manchester (38): Hayslip 2 1-2 5, Roberts 5 3-7 13, Elam 0 1-4 1, Rickett 3 1-2 7, Horner 4 0-0 8, Crabtree 2 0-1 4, Team 16 6-10 38.
Three-Point Goals:
W. Lahtam (7): Cattaneo 2, Owens 3, Janes 2