The Norris City-Omaha-Enfield High School basketball team headed to Crab Orchard Tuesday evening to play their first Greater Egyptian Conference game of the season. It was expected that this contest, just like so many in the previous years, would go right down to the wire. This prediction, knowing Crab Orchard returned four of their five starters from the previous year, was right on the money.
First quarter action found the Crab Orchard Trojans jumping out to the early lead, but NCOE did not shy away. The Fighting Cardinals used their aggressive defense behind a Nolan Sutton steal that led to a layup and one to find NCOE taking their first lead of the game at 12-11, with 2:47 remaining in the quarter. The score seemed to stay at a one point difference the rest of the way until Dakota Bond hit a jumper at the buzzer to increase the NCOE lead to 22-19. The second quarter was more of a trading baskets episode until the Trojans appeared to come alive offensively and reclaim the lead and push ahead 37-31 with 1:39 left in the second quarter. NCOE responded well to this Crab Orchard surge with one of their own to cut the Trojan lead to two (38-36) behind a Matt Long steal and layup as the buzzer sounded.
Following halftime, NCOE answered back from being outscored by five points in the previous quarter by outscoring Crab Orchard by four points in the third quarter to claim their own two point lead (52-50) with one full quarter of play left. The fourth quarter was full of entertainment with the numerous lead changes. However, when the Trojans hit a three pointer with .33 seconds to go, it appeared the game was over. After a missed free throw and an NCOE timeout, Dakota Bond drove to the basket and hit the game tying layup with time expiring to force overtime.
In the extra four minute period, the back and forth pace continued, but it appeared momentum had shifted the Fighting Cardinal way when they took a 73-72 lead forcing a Trojan timeout. Coming out of the timeout, NCOE took a 74-72 lead behind a Matt Long free throw with under five seconds remaining. With emotions running high and victory at their fingertips, NCOE would be silenced when Crab Orchard inbounded the ball and found an open man who drained the long range three pointer to hand the Fighting Cardinals their first conference loss, 75-74.
Matt Long had the hot hand for the Fighting Cardinals with 21 points (nine coming from three point land). Chase Sutton and Dakota Bond also reached double digits for NCOE with 16 and 12 points. Others scoring in the contest were Cooper Wells eight, Nolan Sutton six, Jake Delap six, Brantley Neal three, and Marcus Niehaus two.
NCOE(4-2, 0-1) will be back in action on Friday, December 4, when they host the Thompsonville Tigers in another GEC conference game.
The junior varsity contest had all the makings of a lopsided win for the Fighting Cardinals when they jumped out to the early 17-5 first quarter lead, but Crab Orchard started to find their rhythm and came alive offensively knocking down several shots to tie the contest at 20 all with one minute left in the half. NCOE was able to put three more points on the board to claim the 23-20 halftime lead.
Second half action would find the NCOE offense slowing down and struggling to get anything going as Crab Orchard would go on to outscore them 28-12 and hand the Fighting Cardinals the 48-35 loss.
NCOE (0-1) was led in scoring by Ben Taylor with 12 points. Others scoring were Trenton Verble eight, Evan Healy five, Jeb Baumgart four, and three each for Brandon Skaggs and Colton O’Neal.
