North Platte junior Creek Johnson made all seven of his shots and ended with a team-high 19 points in the Panthers first tournament championship since 2016 as they defeated Pattonsburg 66-48 on Jan. 13.
Winning tournament games hasn’t been common in recent years for the North Platte boys’ basketball team (7-8), but the Panthers made a season high eight shots from deep in back-to-back games en route to winning the First Annual Wildcard Invitational on Jan. 13.
It’s been a long time since North Platte was on the winning side of any regular season bracket, let alone being the champion when the tournament ended. Before last season, the Panthers had lost their last 12 tournament games counting the postseason and the last 16 regular season tournament games, consistently being double eliminated in them.
Since the arrival of second-year head coach Braydn Kemper, North Platte has had more success in regular season tournament play as it went 3-5 last season and has matched that win total in the Wildcard Invitational alone. Before last season, the Panthers hadn’t won any tournament games in the regular season since winning the consolation side of the North Platte Tournament on January 26, 2018, so the current roster has very little experience in such games.
North Platte freshman Brenden Matt celebrates after one of his four made 3-pointers in the First Annual WildCard Championship Game.
“It feels great for the kids because they’ve been working hard all season and the results haven’t quite shown yet,” Kemper said after the Panthers defeated Pattonsburg (9-5) in the Wildcard Invitational Championship. “I thought if we started playing well in this tournament that we can put together a couple wins, and we did.”
In the championship, North Platte scored the opening bucket before falling behind 14-6 when the first quarter ended. Westin Snook and Brenden Matt both made a shot from downtown in the next 1:14 to help outscore Polo 24 to seven in the second quarter – capped off by another 3-pointer by Snook with 41 seconds left – to lead 30-21 at the break.
North Platte scored the final seven points of the second quarter and the first seven points of the third quarter to blow the game wide open. Snook added another shot from deep and Matt made two more in the frame to put North Platte up 47-29 with one quarter remaining.
Wesley Meadows shot four-of-seven from the charity stripe and ended with eight points in the 66-48 win over Pattonsburg.
“In the first quarter, we were getting good, nice looks and weren’t knocking them down. We just weren’t hitting, and I told them to keep it up, don’t be discouraged and keep shooting. Then we got really hot in the second and third quarter and it helped us win,” Kemper said.
Creek Johnson was a force down low – making all seven of his shots, along with shooting five-for-six at the charity stripe – as he secured a double-double with 19 points and 10 rebounds in the 66-48 championship victory. Matt scored 18 points and Snook finished with nine points as the duo was responsible for seven of North Platte’s eight 3-pointers.
“I told them it’s been a while since North Platte played for a tournament championship and since we’ve won one, it feels good to say they finally did it. We’re a young team but we have a lot of great senior leadership around it, and we’ve got a lot of guys stepping up,” Kemper said.
Kaden Mullendore shoots a jump shot in the first half on Jan. 13.
While the Panthers have won some tournament games in recent years, 2016 was the last time they have won any championship, with that one being the North Platte Tournament. Coincidentally enough, that game was against Mid-Buchanan where Coach Kemper was a senior point guard for the Dragons at the time, so he has been involved the last two times North Platte has won a tournament.
“The first one hurt me. The last one feels a whole heck of a lot better than that one,” Kemper said.
Kemper also told the Platte County Citizen that although he lost to North Platte in that tournament championship, he led Mid-Buchanan to a 16-point win over the Panthers later that season when he scored 24 points. Fast forward nearly seven years, and Coach Kemper was once again involved in a tournament matchup between those two schools as North Platte defeated Mid-Buchannan’s JV team 68-26 in the opening round of the Wildcard Invitational on Jan. 9.
North Platte head coach Braydn Kemper helped the Panthers win their first tournament since 2016 when he was on the opposing side as a player for Mid-Buchanan his senior year.
The next round was a more competitive game when the Panthers were in a battle with Osborn with Stewartsville (6-5) on Jan. 11. The Panthers trailed 14-10 after eight minutes of play but were up 25-23 at halftime.
North Platte pushed the margin to 41-33 after three quarters and held off the Wildcards behind a hot-shooting night when the Panthers knocked down eight treys, all of which were by freshmen. Dylan Armstrong led the team with 17 points when he made two 3-pointers, Hunter Palmer made four of his nine attempts to finish with 12 points and Matt shot two-of-three from deep to end with 11 points.
“We have good shooters on the team, it just hasn’t showed up yet in the games and I kept telling them don’t be discouraged, just keep shooting. We finally started hitting and it just felt like eyes wide open when we started hitting so let’s keep shooting,” Kemper said.
Since 2016 to 2021, North Platte has posted a 7-29 overall record in tournaments but are now 6-8 in the last two seasons. The Panthers will look to add some more tallies in the win column in the North Platte Tournament that starts on Jan. 23.