With the North Platte Tournament Consolation Championship on the line, the North Platte boys’ basketball team (9-12) took an early margin over Mound City (13-8) but let the lead slip away before halftime and was unable to fully recover.
Mound City was the No. 5 seed and North Platte was the No. 7 seed as this was the second matchup of the season between the squads. Mound City came out on top 37-34 earlier this winter on Dec. 13 before winning 58-41 in the rematch on Jan. 27.
In the consolation championship, North Platte started off strong by scoring the first nine points of the night – six of which were by freshman Dylan Armstrong – until Mound City finally scored a layup with 4:24 on the clock. Hunter Palmer beat the first quarter buzzer with a layup to put North Platte up 11-5.
After a combined six second quarter points between Creek Johnson and Armstrong made the score 17-8, Mound City scored the final nine points of the half – and made it an 11-0 run after the first bucket of the third quarter – to take a 21-17 advantage heading into the locker room. Palmer knocked down a triple from the left corner in the opening two minutes of the third quarter to bring the game within three points, but Mound City scored six straight to extend the lead to 29-20.
North Platte freshman Dylan Armstrong scored 16 points on seven-of-10 shooting in the 58-41 loss to Mound City in the North Platte Tournament Consolation Championship on Jan. 27.
“We didn’t get matched up and that led to wide open threes and wide open layups,” North Platte boys’ basketball coach Braydn Kemper said. “We just didn’t play great defensively in the second quarter after we started off hot and then after that, it kind of just seemed like we lost our legs, we lost mentally and we lost that toughness that we needed.”
Johnson and Armstrong scored two straight buckets late in the third quarter to bring the game within reaching distance, but Mound City converted on a 3-point play with 5.6 seconds left to lead 38-32. Brenden Matt knocked down a triple from the right corner in the opening seconds of the fourth quarter, but once again, Mound City answered – this time with eight straight points – to eventually push the margin to 17 points and won the game.
“In the second half, they (Mound City) played harder than we did and they moved one of their kids that we were kind of laying off and they put him to high post and let him rip and go from there and I thought that was effective for them. We didn’t have very good help behind it, so we couldn’t stop it. We weren’t mentally locked in, and you have to be that way when you play a good team like Mound City,” Kemper said.
Armstrong had a team-high 16 points on a day where he shot seven-of-10 from the field and made his only 3-point attempt. Matt ended with nine points and Johnson had eight points.
North Platte had an impressive outing in its first two games of the tournament, starting with a near upset over Mid-Buchanan (11-9) – who was the No. 2 seed – on Jan. 24. The Panthers were in a back-and-forth four quarters with the Dragons, that came down to the wire.
With less than one minute to play, the game was tied at 42 and after a controversial call with 12 seconds left where the ball appeared to hit a Mid-Buchanan player and bounce out-of-bounds, the Dragons were awarded possession of the ball. Mid-Buchanan took advantage of the call as Joe Clark drove down the baseline and dished the ball to Cade Brinton who made a layup with around two seconds left.
North Platte didn’t have a timeout and had to heave a full court shot attempt at the buzzer as a last ditch effort, but missed, and fell 44-42. Johnson had a career-high – and game-high – 21 points on the day to go with nine rebounds and one assist.
“We competed with a really good powerhouse program in the area, went toe-to-toe with them for a long time and didn’t quite get away with the win but what I liked is the kids weren’t just happy that they competed, they wanted to win, and I told them that I’m proud of them for that,” Kemper said.
In the next game of the tournament, North Platte all but locked in a top-5 seed in districts with a win over Braymer (10-8), who is a Class 2 District 15 opponent. The Panthers outscored their opponent in every quarter and defeated the Bobcats 56-45 on Jan. 25.
Matt and Johnson both poured out 17 points apiece and Armstrong had 11 points. After the tournament, North Platte bounced back from the recent stretch that saw four losses in its last five games with a 67-32 home victory over DeKalb (1-15) on Jan. 30.
The 67 points was the most North Platte has scored at home since 2020 as 10 players scored, led by Johnson with 14 points. Westin Snook had 11 points – nine of which were in the second quarter alone – and Jayce Gibson had eight points.
North Platte will have five games left this season, starting with a home matchup with Excelsior Springs (4-13) on Feb. 1. After that the Panthers will end regular season play with four consecutive KCI Conference matchups.