NOTICE SERVED BY BEARCATS

The Booneville Bearcat basketball team served noticed on Conference 3A-4 last night with aa 58-26 drumming of Charleston, at the Tiger Center.

Welcoming five football players, two of whom drew starting assignments, the Bearcats (6-3, 1-0 in 3A-1) ran off 13 straight points over five and a half minutes of the first quarter and opened a lead as big as 18 before halftime.

During the game opening run it was Cody Sum, Colter Fisher, Nate Smith, Wesley Fonseca and Jace Washburn all contributing in the scoring.

That would be a game long theme as nine of the 11 different Bearcats to play in the game scored with six scoring at least five.

One of those was Wesley Fonseca, whose playing time has steadily increased during nonconference play. Fonseca had all five of his points in the first quarter.

Noah Harrel started the second quarter attack with a basket on a feed from Fisher and would close the scoring in the half for the Bearcats with a 3. It was 31-18 at the intermission though nobody in purple had scored more than five.

In his first basketball action Fisher would score seven points and hand out five assists, matching Harrel in the assist column.

The second half saw the Bearcats limit the Tigers to a pair of third quarter free throws and a pair of fourth quarter 3 pointers.

It was 41-20 through three quarters and the Bearcats still did not have a double digit scorer, though Harrel was at nine, Sum and Smith were at eight, and Dax Goff, seeing his first basketball action since he was a freshman, had eight rebounds.

After Sum hit the 10 point mark, Harrel would add a 3 that kicked in the sportsmanship rule give hem a game high 12.

Smith would score 44 seconds later to also hit the 10 point mark and Goff would grab a couple more rebounds to hit double digits to go along with his seven points before checking out for the night.

With the clock in continuous mode, Dakota Mattson logged his first points of the season and Aiden Carter joined the scoring party.

The Bearcats will be idle until Friday, January 5 when they make a trip to Paris, which will be followed by a makeup game with Cedarville at home on January 6.

Girls

The Lady Bearcats were in charge early but Charleston was deadly from beyond the arc.

The Lady Bearcats (3-6, 0-1) were up 16-9 in the final minute of the opening quarter but a late 3, and another to start the second quarter had the Lady Tigers within 16-15.

At that point Charleston had hit five 3s and the Lady Tigers would hit three more before halftime and finish with 13 of them.

The Lady Bearcats used the 3 themselves to reassert themselves. Consecutive 3s by Lexi Franklin and Linley Garrett had the Lady Bearcats up nine at 24-15 with 6:26 to go in the first half.

Franklin and Garrett would both score 17 to lead the Lady Bearcats.

It was still an eight point lead at 26-18 after Garrett scored on an assist from Angie Brown with 4:58 to play in the half, but the Lady Bearcats cooled.

Charleston did not, scoring 12 unanswered to lead 30-26 at the intermission.

A Tempi Terry basket and another 3 from Franklin gave the Lady Bearcats the lead back at 31-30.

Terry continued her impressive sophomore season with another 10 point night. She has averaged 11 a game over the last four tips.

Terry’s second basket of the half was another of six lead changes over a span of 2:56 that saw Charleston go in front 37-36.

The final change of the series started another 12-0 Charleston run that the Lady Bearcats could not overcome.

The Lady Bearcats will be in action during the Christmas break playing host Ozark in the opening round of the Bank OZK Classic at 7:20 p.m. December 28. The three game guarantee tournament continues through December 30.