HARREL, BEARCATS TO WELCOME REINFORCEMENTS

For almost six weeks the Booneville Bearcat basketball roster consisted of seven players. That left little room for foul trouble, little room for an off night, or little room for much of a break.

In more than one game this season foul counts and or performance have dictated who Coach Ronnie Denton should, and at times, could have on the floor.

The seven who have taken the floor for eight games this season are all juniors, includes Noah Harrel.

“Noah is a great leader and teammate who is always looking for ways to improve and help his team,” said Denton.

Harrel, who was all conference as a sophomore, has averaged 11.4 points, 4.3 rebounds, and more than two steals and assists while the Bearcats have built a 5-3 record.

Tomorrow night there will be as many as 11 in uniform for a Conference 3A-1 opener in Charleston.

The influx of reinforcements will be in the form of multiple sport athletes who were involved with football through December 9.

Playing on the hardwood are seniors Colter Fisher and Dax Goff, juniors Jace Washburn and Dakota Mattson, and sophomore Conner Droemer, who was out all football season with a prolonged injury that is expected to affect basketball as well.

“It’s going to be less tiring but I still think we’re going to play as much as we already are,” said Harrel. “We are deeper but the starting five we’ll have may be able to get up (big) by halftime.”

Last week’s scheduled games were moved to January 6 (Cedarville) and January 18 (Hackett).

“We just worked in with the football boys. Let them touch a ball and shoot around a little bit,” Harrel said of the off week, at least in terms of games.

It actually went a little deeper than that, he admits.

“It was a lot more physical practice. It’s a lot more competitive than going against the junior boys in practice,” said Harrel.

Harrel often builds his stat line, good or bad, from beyond the three point arc.

“I have days where I can’t hit the rim at all and I have days where I can’t miss,” said Harrel.

Twice Harrel has led or co-led the Bearcats scoring and he has hit double digits six times this season.

Because the football players return just in time for conference play there is still little room for error and every team other than the Bearcats has started conference play.

Charleston, who will be the first the Bearcats see, is off to a 2-0 start in conference play and will be the initial measuring stick for the Bearcats in league play.

Hackett and Cedarville have won their only games and Cossatot River and Paris have split two.

Besides beating Cossatot and Two Rivers, Charleston (6-5) has also beaten Hackett in a tournament setting.

Hackett, who the Bearcats will see twice in a five day period in mid-January, is off to an 8-2 start.

“Coach Denton said Hackett is one of the best teams. We lost two seniors (last year) but they didn’t really lose anything. We’re looking forward to playing them too.”

Harrel follows a family tradition in wearing the 14 jersey his brother Cody wore as a quarterback, point guard, and shortstop and dad Casey wore while playing high school sports in Oklahoma.

“I didn’t really care (at first), but now I’d rather have it than not,” Harrel said of the number.

The son of Brenda and Casey Harrel, Harrel has a class schedule he terms as “not too bad” but includes Spanish II, pre-calculus/trigonometry, civics, AP language, chemistry, family sciences and, of course, basketball.