Ladies and gentlemen, meet Christian Bundy…
The 6-foot-6 Nixa junior picked the perfect time for a breakout performance, scoring a game-high 16 points to lead Nixa to a 61-52 win over rival Ozark in the championship of Houlihan's Springfield Catholic Invitational Saturday.
“Bundy is a load and when he shoots the ball with his shoulders square he does a great job,” said Nixa coach Jay Osborne.”
Bundy’s frontcourt mate, 6-foot-7 senior Chase Allen, agreed with Osborne’s assessment.
“Christian is a monster, he is definitely one of the best post players in the area,” said Allen. “I’m happy to play with him this year; he has a bright future ahead of him.”
After Ozark scored six of the game’s first seven points of the game, a pair of 3s by Kylan Hewett-Newbill, the Eagles countered with an 11-0 run, attacking Ozark’s zone with hi-low action and going to junior guard Seth Viebrock when that didn’t work.
Nixa led 18-10 after one and 24-16 at the half.
Viebrock was able to control the tempo of the game, coupling an ability to facilitate with his knack for getting to the rim and knocking down perimeter jumpers.
He finished with 12 points, but controlled the game from tip to the final horn.
“That’s what makes them tough to play, you’re so focused on stopping the hi-low and the inside play that you can’t pressure the perimeter as much,” said Ozark coach Mark Schweitzer. “They did a great job. Viebrock had an awesome game for them and exactly what they needed him to do. We knew about Bundy and knew about Allen and ultimately I thought we did a good job on them.”
After trailing 37-25 entering the fourth quarter Ozark cut the deficit to just six on Hewett-Newbill’s conventional three-point play, 44,38, but Nixa again had an answer with an old-fashioned 3-point play by Bundy being followed up with an Allen offensive rebound that led to free throws.
“We had opportunities to claw back in but we just weren’t able to do that,” said Schweitzer. “We have to find ways to finish.”
In addition to Bundy’s 16 and Viebrock’s 12, Allen added 15 for Nixa. Hewett-Newbill finished with 11 and was the only Tiger to reach double figures.
Nixa has won five straight and 10 of the last 12 meetings with Ozark. The Tigers are now 0-3 when scoring less than 55 points and with another meeting in just over a month with Nixa, one that will likely decide the fate of the COC Large, Schweitzer and Ozark must figure out how to make shots against Nixa’s 2-3 zone.
“Knocking down shots is the story of this game; we didn’t shoot it well,” said Schweitzer. “We are very good shooters, I think we just missed shots. We shoot 40% from 3 and 60% from 2. So if you tell me that Nixa is going to sit in a zone and dare you to shoot I would say ‘Okay, let’s do it’ and I’ve got all the faith in our kids that they’ll knock down shots.”
After the loss to Bolivar in the championship of the Blue and Gold Tournament, Nixa has put together four straight wins, running its overall streak 38 wins in the Eagles’ last 41 games, suggesting that there is no chink in Nixa’s armor.
“We have some kids playing really well right now and we are playing with some passion and some effort,” said Osborne. “We didn’t have that swagger or that attitude at the Blue and Gold for whatever reason, poor coaching probably, but we’ve had some visits the past few weeks and its paid off.
I’m really proud of our guys, we could have pouted and felt sorry for ourselves after that Blue and Gold loss which was very disappointing, but they didn’t. They got in the gym, got some things done and got better. I feel good about our team now, I didn’t a few weeks ago, but I do now. We’ve got some kids that have figured it out.”
Nixa will visit Hartville on Tuesday, while Ozark will travel to Webb City for its COC Large opener.
