The hot streak continued for the Park Hills Central Rebels this week, as they breezed through West County and Farmington on their brief road trip. The wins boosted their record to 17-2 on the season and made it five in a row since a brief hiccup against MICDS.
The week kicked off on Tuesday as the Rebels traveled to West County to take on the 11-7 Bulldogs, and it didn’t take long for Central to get going. A 14-5 first quarter, helped by six points from Kendall Horton, put the Rebels in an early, fortuitous position.
They turned the dial up even further in the second, sparked by a big three and seven points from Jobe Bryant. Eighteen total points in the quarter put the Rebels up 32-20 at the half. And they never looked back.
In fact, that first half was just a warmup for the raucous third quarter. Central hit four threes (two courtesy of Horton) and Bryant poured in another nine points to extend the lead to an insurmountable 59-25. The fourth was a more timid affair, but the Rebels still managed to outscore the Bulldogs 10-6 and slammed the door on the 69-31 win.
Bryant paced the scoring with 18 points, but Central had four players in double figures. Horton and his trio of treys was good for 15, Mason Williams had a dozen and Caden Casey managed 11 in the blowout victory.
That win was the 16th of the season for the red-hot Rebels and they were on their way to Farmington three days later to take on the Knights. The 7-11 Farmington squad has struggled this season, but the had no hope of turning things around on Friday, as this loaded Rebels club fired shots early.
A trio of threes in the first and five points each from Williams and Bryant had Central sitting pretty after eight minutes with a 21-7 lead. The second frame was even more impressive, as they dropped 28 on the Knights, with Bryant leading the charge with nine more. Farmington managed 14 this go-round, but they still found themselves in a substantial hole, trailing 49-21 at the break.
The Rebels didn’t take the charitable way out in the the second half, as witnessed by 22 more points in the third quarter. Bryant tacked on seven more before sitting out the remainder of the game and Collin McMullen nailed a pair of big threes to put the game out of reach.
With Central coasting, the bench got some minutes and Farmington was able to save a little face with a 14-11 final quarter, but the game was well out of reach by that point. The final tally was 82-43 and the Rebels had locked up their 17th victory in convincing fashion.
Bryant led all scorers with 21 points, despite not playing in much of the second half, which was impressive considering no one on the Knights was able to top seven points in the contest. McMullen came alive from downtown in this one and was responsible for half of the team’s eight three-pointers. He finished with 14 points and Casey rounded out the top scorers with his 12 on the night.
It was a dominant effort on both ends of the court, and has Central looking like the team to beat in the upcoming Conference Tournament. They will get a brief tuneup on 1/31 as they host Fredericktown before the tourney kicks off.
