BOWLING GREEN THREE WINS AWAY FROM STATE CHAMPIONSHIP
LEXINGTON — Bowling Green High School senior center LynKaylah James stepped out of the interview room and headed toward the floor area at Rupp Arena. She cast an eye toward the huge video board hanging over midcourt and smiled.
The Lady Purples are gonna be here awhile.
Bowling Green won its opening-round game in the KHSAA Girls Sweet Sixteen on Thursday morning, using a 10-0 run midway through the fourth quarter to knock off Letcher County Central 58-45.
The Lady Purples improved to 28-7 with the victory and will square off with Cooper High School in quarterfinal play at 5 p.m. CDT on Friday. Win that one, and BGHS coach Calvin Head’s squad will be just two victories from the first KHSAA state championship in school history.
Cooper (23-9) rolled to a 57-37 victory over Pikeville on Thursday afternoon, with sophomore guard Kendall Palmer leading the Lady Jaguars with 22 points.
James, a 6-foot-1 senior, understands the Sweet Sixteen is a rare opportunity, and she was thrilled to see all her teammates get a chance to check into the game and savor the experience.
“In the fourth quarter,” James said, “we really just wanted to push the lead, so we could get everybody in the game. That was important, for the senior class … We just wanted them to feel the court, here at Rupp, take it all in …”
James and BGHS forward Meadow Tisdale, the KHSAA 4th Region Player of the Year, controlled the area near the basket, allowing their teammates to take some chances on the perimeter. The Lady Purples never trailed in the game, forcing 18 Letcher County Central turnovers, half of them steals.
“We were able to separate a little bit, in the fourth quarter,” Head said. “We were able to get in more of a groove, offensively. We always try to set the tone, defensively.
“We have the pieces to defend at a high level.”
That was ultimately the difference, the Lady Purples’ ability to lock down on defense when they needed it most.
“I think we played very well,” Tisdale said. “We knew we had to ‘stay connected’ and just pick each other up and finish the job. We’re looking forward to the rest of this tournament …
“If we continue to play hard, and play our style of basketball, I believe we’ll have success.”
Stay connected.
That was the refrain the Lady Purples used last week, in their three decisive victories in claiming the KHSAA’s 4th Region championship for the third consecutive year at WKU’s E.A. Diddle Arena.
Stay connected.
Communicate on defense. Be patient on offense. Minimize the mistakes. Survive and advance.
“Offensively, we just tried to push it inside,” BGHS junior guard Saniyah Shelton said. “I think we got the first-game jitters out of our system … We just have to keep playing hard.”
Stay connected.
Shelton, a point guard who can slash to the basket with the best of ’em, logged a team-high 31 minutes on the floor and finished the game with four points, eight assists and four steals.
Shelton can change the tempo of the game in an instant, which is often the cue for her teammates to keep moving on the floor.
“Saniyah instills so much confidence in her teammates,” BGHS coach Calvin Head said. “She just stabilizes our team, at the offensive end of the floor. She has the qualities you’re looking for, in your point guard.”
Meadow Tisdale, the Lady Purples’ leading scorer, picked up her third foul early in the fourth quarter but still finished with a game-high 18 points on 6-of-11 shooting, along with five rebounds and two steals.
Bowling Green’s LynKaylah James had 15 points, four rebounds and three blocked shots, hitting 7 of 8 free throws as the Lady Purples extended their lead down the stretch.
As a team, Bowling Green hit 15 of 19 free throws, or 80 percent from the line. BGHS senior guard Ava Bennett, usually one of the first players off Calvin Head’s bench, drilled a couple critical 3-point field goals and had eight points in just 11 minutes on the floor.
The Lady Purples’ Tanaya Bailey hit a 12-foot shot in the final moments of the first half, sending Bowling Green into the locker room with a 27-17 lead at the break. Bailey also had eight points, while adding five rebounds.
“We’re excited to advance,” Head said at the postgame press conference. “We have a lot of respect for Letcher County Central. The kids play extremely hard, they’re well-coached. I told our kids to stick to our script defensively, do what we wanted to do.
“We are just excited to be playing tomorrow.”
Kaylee Banks led Letcher County Central, a small school in southeast Kentucky near the Virginia state line, leading the Lady Cougars with 16 points. LCC teammates Keira Couch and Loren Boggs each finished with 8 points.
Bowling Green slipped by Bishop Brossart, 50-48, in its first-round Sweet Sixteen game last year. The Lady Purples would lose in quarterfinal play, falling to eventual state champion Sacred Heart 66-54.
Bowling Green reached the Sweet Sixteen in 2020, too, but the dawning of the COVID-19 pandemic forced the cancellation of the tournament, on the day the Lady Purples were scheduled to play Russell High School.
The Lady Purples’ Calvin Head, however, cautions against Bowling Green or any other Sweet Sixteen squad finding some kind of comfort zone playing at Rupp Arena.
It’s a huge facility, with a seating capacity of more than 24,000, and the bright lights serving as a reminder that the stakes get higher with each passing day.
That much, the Lady Purples will experience in Friday evening’s quarterfinal matchup with Cooper High School. The Lady Jaguars (23-9) hail from Boone County, southwest of Cincinnati, and have won 11 consecutive games.
“A lot of people,” Head said in a measured tone, “want to talk about us playing up here last year, being a little familiar (with Rupp Arena) … You can’t get familiar with playing at Rupp Arena. It’s different than any place else you’re going to play.
“We just wanted to make sure that we set the tone defensively, so if we did have any offensive stuggles we knew that we could still be competitive within the game. I thought we did that.”
