By Amanda Perkins (For OzarksSportsZone.com)
It was Logan-Rogersville’s third consecutive trip to the state quarterfinals, and also their third year to draw Father Tolton Catholic as a quarterfinal opponent. For the second year in a row, the Wildcats emerged victorious, 59-50.
Ranked second in Class 4 all season, the Wildcats faced off against a well-matched Tolton team Friday night.
“We knew it was going to be a dogfight,” said Rogersville head coach John Schaefer. “There are really good athletes out there playing and physicality was crazy. We talked about how really this was not a game about x’s and o’s like how some of them are, but this is going to be ‘the strong survive.’ I thought that we had a better size in the post that could do some things that they couldn’t do. Obviously, their guard play is tremendous, and they are super hard to guard. I was just happy with the effort our guys gave.”
The teams started with breakneck speed, and Wildcat sophomore Chase Branham drained his first three and quickly followed it with another to go up 9-6. Tolton answered with their own shot from downtown and drew the foul to take the lead. Titus Moore connected underneath to inspire a “He’s a freshman” chant from the crowd and to inch ahead, 13-12. Rogersville’s threes began to rim out and the Wildcats trailed after the first, 16-13.
In the second, the Wildcats held the Trailblazers to just eight total points and put up 15 of their own, including two buckets from senior Jase Pettifurd underneath and three points from the charity stripe from Branham. Logan-Rogersville entered the half with a 28-24 lead.
One of Rogersville’s challenges was to throw a wrench in the game of Tolton senior standout and Mizzou commit Aaron Rowe. Coach Schaefer said stopping Rowe was a team effort, with guards tasked with slowing him down and 6’7” junior post Marcus Moore with stopping him.
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“Marcus probably caused Rowe more problems than the guards did,” said Schaefer. “He moves really well for a big kid and really dialed in and got going in the second half.”
Despite turnovers and stagnant scoring with just six points in the third, the Wildcats managed to hold Tolton to 7 points in an increasingly physical contest.
In the fourth, Tolton pulled ahead with just under two minutes to play, but freshman Titus Moore proved to have nerves of steel as he sunk two free throws and regained the lead. But it was Branham’s six points at the free throw line that proved to be clutch down the stretch, though just a fraction of his 30 points on the night.
Coach Schaefer praised Branham’s high level of play.
“He got loose and he hit some big shots for us, and that’s what he’s always done,” he said.
Branham is just a sophomore and already a D1 prospect, but the team also features two freshmen, a junior, and a senior. “The future is going to be bright,” said Schaefer.
The Wildcats move on to the semifinal round of the Class 4 tournament.
“We just want to get there, that’s the goal every year,” said Schaefer. “We’ve learned our team has gotten a little tougher as the year went on, and we’ve beat some high-caliber opponents I probably didn’t think we were capable of beating at the time, and things started clicking. They’ve held true to that, but we haven’t had a game this physical and tough for probably the last ten games.”
“We know what it takes to get there, and now we have to go back to work and get ready for the same type of play,” he added.
The Wildcats will take on the Benton Cardinals at 4 pm next Friday night at Mizzou Arena.
