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The Chillicothe High School basketball Hornets have a difficult assignment awaiting them Thursday evening when they meet the top-seeded Platte County Pirates in the semifinals of the Class 4 District 16 Tournament Chillicothe is hosting this week. However, it is a task the Hornets clearly and eagerly sought.
Chillicothe (13-13) earned the opportunity to test the 16-9 Pirates by overcoming three scoring droughts that, strung together, accounted for over half of their first-round game with Smithville Tuesday to gain a scrappy 41-38 victory, the first postseason win for a CHS boys’ hoops squad in five years. Platte County meanwhile had an opening-round bye.
The Hornets and favored Platte County will tip off Thursday’s boys’ semifinals slate at 5:30 p.m., followed by second-seeded Savannah meeting No. 3 seed St. Joseph: Lafayette.
PCHS begins district play on a modest 2-game winning streak, but the most-recent loss was to Grandview, which is ranked No. 7 in the state in Class 4 by Missouri Basketball Coaches Association poll voters. Chillicothe snapped a 4-game losing streak with Tuesday’s score-evening triumph over No. 4 seed Smithville.
Even though Platte County was a member of the Midland Empire Conference with Chillicothe for just over a decade from the mid-1990s through the 2007-08 school year, their boys’ basketball teams have not met since PCHS’ departure to the Suburban Conference’s Blue (Small Six) Division.
While they haven’t met face to face, this season has seen each play at least seven games against opponents the other also has faced. The Pirates are 7-1 in those seven, the Hornets 5-2.
Both have a pair of easy victories over Excelsior Springs and one over St. Joseph: Benton. Platte County topped Maryville twice, the Hornets doing that once. Each has a win over Smithville, although Chillicothe also has a loss to the Warriors. The last common foe is Liberty: North, which waxed the unknown-commodity Hornets by 25 in their season debut in the Savannah tournament. Liberty: North topped Platte County by six in that tourney’s title game, but last week the Pirates squared things with a 4-point triumph.
Of those games, Platte County has prevailed decisively (16 or more points) four times, Chillicothe three times. That the Hornets lost to Smithville by 18 in a game which probably ranks as a fluke, given that the Warriors shot nearly 65 percent from the field that night, and by the 25 against Liberty: North is the greatest disparity reflected in their in-common competition.
The Chillicothe High School basketball Hornets have a difficult assignment awaiting them Thursday evening when they meet the top-seeded Platte County Pirates in the semifinals of the Class 4 District 16 Tournament Chillicothe is hosting this week. However, it is a task the Hornets clearly and eagerly sought.
Chillicothe (13-13) earned the opportunity to test the 16-9 Pirates by overcoming three scoring droughts that, strung together, accounted for over half of their first-round game with Smithville Tuesday to gain a scrappy 41-38 victory, the first postseason win for a CHS boys’ hoops squad in five years. Platte County meanwhile had an opening-round bye.
The Hornets and favored Platte County will tip off Thursday’s boys’ semifinals slate at 5:30 p.m., followed by second-seeded Savannah meeting No. 3 seed St. Joseph: Lafayette.
PCHS begins district play on a modest 2-game winning streak, but the most-recent loss was to Grandview, which is ranked No. 7 in the state in Class 4 by Missouri Basketball Coaches Association poll voters. Chillicothe snapped a 4-game losing streak with Tuesday’s score-evening triumph over No. 4 seed Smithville.
Even though Platte County was a member of the Midland Empire Conference with Chillicothe for just over a decade from the mid-1990s through the 2007-08 school year, their boys’ basketball teams have not met since PCHS’ departure to the Suburban Conference’s Blue (Small Six) Division.
While they haven’t met face to face, this season has seen each play at least seven games against opponents the other also has faced. The Pirates are 7-1 in those seven, the Hornets 5-2.
Both have a pair of easy victories over Excelsior Springs and one over St. Joseph: Benton. Platte County topped Maryville twice, the Hornets doing that once. Each has a win over Smithville, although Chillicothe also has a loss to the Warriors. The last common foe is Liberty: North, which waxed the unknown-commodity Hornets by 25 in their season debut in the Savannah tournament. Liberty: North topped Platte County by six in that tourney’s title game, but last week the Pirates squared things with a 4-point triumph.
Of those games, Platte County has prevailed decisively (16 or more points) four times, Chillicothe three times. That the Hornets lost to Smithville by 18 in a game which probably ranks as a fluke, given that the Warriors shot nearly 65 percent from the field that night, and by the 25 against Liberty: North is the greatest disparity reflected in their in-common competition.
The score comparisons, however, also can offer some hope for the Hornets to be at least competitive in Thursday’s game.
Chillicothe whipped Excelsior Springs by similar margins to the Pirates and topped Maryville by 10, a team PCHS topped by 16 once, but by eight the other time. The Hornets clobbered Benton by 23 recently after the Cardinals fell to Platte County by a mere six earlier in the season. Benton was without its best and most-experienced player, Chris Young, when it lost in Chillicothe, however.
In terms of the personnel the Hornets will have to try to handle Thursday, the Pirates’ biggest weapon clearly is 6’3” senior guard Jaron Rollins. He is averaging a shade under 20 points the last six games, reaching or topping 20 three times.
“They’re pretty balanced, but he’s their best offensive player,” Chillicothe head coach Tim Cool confirms. “He’s really talented, very athletic, long; just really good. He’s going to be a tough one to guard” as he can shoot from long range, drive to the rim, and hit the offensive glass with effectiveness.
However, as the Hornets’ first-year head coach alluded, Rollins is hardly the Pirates’ only offensive weapon.
Trevor Myers, a 6’2” senior guard, is a sniper type who has had four double-digit scoring games in the last six outings. Brendan Conner, a 6’4” senior, has scored between 11 and 13 points three times in the last five outings. Point guard Sheldon Sparks, a 6-foot senior, was in twin figures against Liberty: North last week and 6’5” junior Jesse Eggers had 10 against Staley last time out. When Platte County drilled Excelsior Springs a couple of weeks back, Naron Rollins, a 6’2” senior, rang up 16 and two other Pirates – DeAndre Ward and Ben Matthews – have had at least one 9-point game recently.
“They’ve got a couple of big kids, they’ve got a kid (Myers) who shoots the ball real well from the perimeter, they’ve got a solid guard (Sparks) who looks pretty good. They’ve got all the pieces – they’ve got size and they’ve got athletic ability, they’ve got good guard play.”
Defensively, the veteran Platte County squad of long-time Pirates head coach Rick Hodge will play baseline to baseline, Cool says his scouting reports and video review discloses.
They’ll mostly use a man-to-man press that also features “run-and-jump” double-teams, but will use a 1-2-2 zone press as a change of pace at times, the CHS coach told the C-T Wednesday.
When a foe gets the ball to the front court and tries to set up its attack, the Pirates will try to thwart it with a swarming man to man.
“They’re just athletic. They get out and guard pretty well,” Cool praises.
Given what seems to be a clear disadvantage in terms of athleticism and size, it seems likely the Hornets will try much the same approach they used against a much-less-accomplished Smithville team – take care of the ball while patiently trying to find an open shot to cut the number of overall possessions and get feisty, hustling defense from everyone in the player rotation, hoping to frustrate the Pirates early on and keep them from ever getting comfortable and into a flow.
