Having been postponed on Monday and Tuesday, the opening round of the 96th New Franklin Invitational was finally held in abbreviated fashion Wednesday, Jan. 8, with only six games taking place. When all was said and done, New Franklin was one of the big winners as both of their teams came away with sizable victories.
The Bulldog boys helped kick off the proceedings by stopping Wellsville-Middletown, 70-44 in a late-afternoon matchup. On top only 12-6 after one period, New Franklin outscored the Tigers 27-6 in the second quarter to take a 39-12 lead at intermission. Down the stretch, the Bulldogs were ahead by more than 30 points before breezing to their 70-44 decision.
Ten players scored for New Franklin as they knocked down 13 three-pointers during the game. Freshman Noah Hackman had three threes and led his side with 21 points while fellow ninth-grader Jonah Bishop provided six trifectas and tallied 18 points, all of his coming in the first half for the 7-3 Bulldogs. Wellsville dropped to 2-7 on the year. Cooper Henderson fired home five threes and tossed in 27 points in a losing cause for the Tigers.
A little later, it was an opportunity for the New Franklin girls to break open a relatively tight game of their own by rolling past Pilot Grove in the second half of their 51-26 win. The Bulldogs played well early, leading 19-7 after one quarter before their opponent sliced the deficit to five, 21-16 just before halftime. After that, New Franklin outscored the Tigers, 30-10 over the final 17 minutes of action on their way to a 25-point victory.
Winners of seven straight, the 9-1 Bulldogs received 20 points from Lilly Chitwood while Pilot Grove fell to 2-8 with no one scoring more than six points for them.
The other first-round contest heard on KMMO-FM Wednesday evening saw the Community R-6 girls slug their way past Sturgeon, winning a 36-27 grinder against the Bulldogs. The victorious Trojans led Sturgeon by as many as 12 points before settling for a nine-point win over their CAC Conference rival. Now 9-2 on the season, Community was led by 11 points from Aaliyah Welch while Sturgeon dropped to 4-6 as Brooke Smith scored 10 points to pace them.
The other opening-round results on Wednesday saw the top-seeded Westran squads earn a pair of victories as their boys defeated Community, 75-22 while the Hornet girls stopped Wellsville-Middletown, 59-24. One other score from Wednesday had the Sturgeon boys edging Pilot Grove, 57-54 despite 30 points by the Tigers’ Beau Walker while Alex Ducayne had 21 for the Bulldogs.
One school not able to make the trek to New Franklin for Wednesday’s first-round action was Prairie Home, who subsequently forfeited the planned matchups they had against the Fayette girls and boys.