Wildcats fall short at Paola

PAOLA — Louisburg boys basketball coach Jason Nelson was disgusted when he looked down at his bench.

It wasn’t the fact that he was disgusted at his team, but more so that he had two players not suited up that could have helped the Wildcats on Tuesday in Paola.

Starting point guard Corbin Wertz, who is the team’s leading scorer and an all-Frontier League player, along with starting wing Mitchell McLellan both sat out with injuries and the Wildcats couldn’t keep up with the bigger, faster Panthers in a 61-42 loss.

“There was 29 points a game sitting on the bench with me,” Nelson said. “We were outsized, like we are most nights, so that hurt a little bit. We still have to play better though.”

After a competitive first quarter, the Wildcats just couldn’t stay with the Panthers in the second. Paola put on a press defense, forced 17 turnovers for the game, which led to some easy baskets. At the same time, Louisburg struggled from the field.

Paola outscored Louisburg 28-9 in the second quarter to pull away from the Wildcats for good. The Wildcats stayed with Paola in the first quarter and trailed just 16-10.

“I think the problem was we came out a little too timid,” Nelson said. “We didn’t do the things that we work on in practice and that we have done all year. We didn’t do a good job of moving without the ball and we didn’t rotate and get back on defense.”

Sophomore forwards Grant Harding and T.J. Dover gave the Wildcats the bulk of the scoring. Harding and Dover each finished with 13 points, while Harding pulled down seven rebounds.

Senior Nathan Moore finished with nine points and Ben Minster came off the bench to lead Louisburg with 10 rebounds.

Louisburg (4-10) contained the Panthers’ runs in the second half and even brought its fans to its feet when Dover nailed a shot from near halfcourt to beat the buzzer in the third quarter. The Wildcats just couldn’t come up with enough offense to get back in the game — it was still sitting on the bench in street clothes.

“Hopefully we can get Corbin back soon, but we are just taking it easy right now with him,” Nelson said. “We actually did do a better job of making better decisions and playing better in the second half, which was good to see.”

The Wildcats will try and rebound when they travel to Eudora on Friday for another Frontier League matchup. Tipoff is set for approximately 7:30 p.m.

LOUISBURG                10           9             13           10 – 42

PAOLA                         16           28           14           3 – 61

LOUISBURG (4-10): Grant Harding 5-13 2-3 13; T.J. Dover 6-11 0-2 13; Nathan Moore 4-7 0-0 9; Ben Minster 2-2 0-0 4; Sam Guetterman 1-4 0-0 2; Brady Lambeth 1-1 0-0 2; Jacob Welsh 1-5 0-0 2. Totals: 20-45 2-5 42. 3-point field goals: 3, (Moore, Harding, Dover)