Wildcats make things close; fall to Greyhounds

As the Whiteoak Wildcats continue their season, they are still looking for the first win, but even in this year of learning the grind of varsity basketball for the young group, they are making scores closer than in previous games.

Case in point on Tuesday night in Southern Hills Athletic Conference action: Though the Wildcats lost 52-42 to the Manchester Greyhounds, they managed to play even with their SHAC foe in the second half.

In that second half, the Wildcats (0-6, 0-10) played even with Manchester, with each team scoring 24 points in 16 minutes, including a fourth frame where WHS outscored the Greyhounds, 15-14. The third frame saw WHS outscored by a point at 10-9.

The first quarter was also close for WHS, as they were just a single point shy of tying the Greyhounds after eight minutes at 14-13, but it was the second quarter that was the biggest difference in the game.

In that second frame, the Wildcats were held to just five points (two points from Brandon Ashbaugh and a 3-pointer by Jacob Burns), while the Greyhounds totaled 14 points in the same eight minutes.

For the game, the Wildcats were led in scoring by Ashbaugh with 13 points, followed by Chase Carraher with nine, and Burns totaled eight in the loss.

Zack Taggett finished with five points, and Cody McClure followed with four points.

Kyle Marler finished with three points for WHS, and he also took two charges, as coach Jeremy McGraw said Marler played hard.

"Kyle played very hard for us," McGraw said. "He took two charges, and I was proud of his play against Manchester."

For the game, WHS was 5-of-7 from the free-throw line, and Manchester was 6-of-11.

Leading Manchester in scoring was Sean Frost with 20 points. Bryan Young followed with 10.