What a Week It Has Been

Jan 26, 2017
7 min read

What a crazy couple of weeks it has been for the Carterville Lions. It's been so busy I don't really know the best place to start.

Carterville Girls Varsity Basketball

As I write this post, the ladies are preparing to take on the Nashville Lady Hornets tonight in Southern Illinois River to River conference action at home.

The Lions are coming off a great week last week, one in which they beat a Mt. Vernon Lady Rams squad that had beaten them just a couple of weeks before. Then they follow up that win with a big win over the Carbondale Lady Terriers 51-43 to win the Carbondale Mid-Winter Classic. Megan Barrett was selected as the tourney MVP.

Not only did Megan earn tourney MVP, she also was selected as The Southern's Player of the Week. Congrats to Megan!

There are only five regular season games left for our Lady Lions. Their record right now is 20-3 for the season. If you have not had the chance to see them play, please make a point to come out and watch Coach Matt Crain, Coach Cowan and the mighty Lady Lions!

UPDATED Friday, January 27

Last night the Carterville Lady Lions knocked off the Nashville Lady Hornets 53-40 to win the Southern Illinois River-to-River Conference Mississippi Division for the first time in school history.

Megan Barrett Just Scored Her 1,000 Career Point (Jan 26, 2017)

Also, Carterville's Megan Barrett scored her 1,000 point in the third quarter of the game. Play was stopped for just a few minutes as they crowd recognized this momentous occasion! Congrats Megan!

I had a chance to talk with Lady Lions Head Coach Matt Crain immediately after the game.

Carterville Varsity Boys

As good of a week that they Lady Lions had, the boys varsity team had an equally frustrating week at the West Frankfort Mid-Winter Classic.

The Lions coming in to the tourney were on a pretty good roll... winners of five of their previous seven games. This included a win at Nashville for the first time in school history and a third place finish in the Duster Thomas Hoops Classic after Christmas and carrying a 4-1 conference record into Max Morris Gymnasium.

The Lions lost a tough game to the number six team in Class 2A the Eldorado Eagles 60-53. This was a game in which the Lions had opportunities to come away with a win, but were just not able to capitalize on those opportunities.

From there things just began to sno-ball as they dropped a heartbreaking OT game to the host West Frankfort Redbirds 52-50. You had to figure that the Redbirds were going to be up to the challenge in their main event of the season on their home floor.

The Lions rebounded with a 64-59 win over the Christopher Bearcats, but then reverted back to a turnover machine with 15 first-half turnovers in a crushing 55-50 loss to the Cairo Pilots.

The Lions have a great chance to right the ship this weekend, when they host the Du Quoin Indians in a SIRR conference game on Friday night. As mentioned earlier, the Lions are 4-1 in the conference and have played well in conference. Which team will show up? We will see Friday night.

Things won't get any easier on Saturday night when the Benton Rangers roll into town. The Rangers have only lost one game this year, and that was in the Duster Thomas HC back in December and they are coming into Saturdays match-up after revenging that early season loss to the Panthers in the championship of the BIT last week.

Despite these losses, keep in mind the Lions are in first place in the Mississippi division of the River-to-River conference and in the drivers seat as six of the next seven games are on our home court.

I can tell you this, both the boys and girls varsity teams are needing strong support from our fans as both season head toward regional play. Please come out and support our Lions!

I do want to say congratulations to Taylor Heil who was voted to the all-tourney team at the WF Mid-Winter Classic. Taylor had 50 points in the Lions four games.

You can watch the Lions and listen to the NewsRadio WJPF play-by-play from Scott Hudson and I below:

Carterville Lion Cheerleading

This past weekend, Carterville High School hosted their first ever cheer competition at CHS.

Sixteen teams participated in the 4 different categories. The Breese Central Cougars were crowned the Grand Champion as they had the highest overall team score of the day.

Congratulations to the the Carterville School Administration, Todd Rogers, Brett Diel, Linda Drust, Bonnie Howerton and all of the volunteers and judges that made this event possible and did a absolutely fantastic job. If there were any problems at all during the day, no one knew it and that's how you know you ran a successful event. As a former event coordinator I can tell you there are ALWAYS issue that you have to deal with, but the secret is to not let anyone know if there were issues.

The next day, the Carterville Cheerleaders made a trip to Breese Mater Dei to compete in the Mater Dei ICCA Invitational Cheer Competition and compete they did as these ladies scored their best finish of the season with 2nd place in the small varsity division. Their ICCA performance is shown below:

The Lions have improved in virtually every competition this year and this Saturday they travel to Troy Triad high school for the IHSA Sectionals. with a qualifying performance, these ladies will head to the State Finals for the second year in a row.

My Ali is on this cheer team and let me tell you...these ladies work so hard each and every day. A lot of people think the only thing these cheer squads do is cheer at football and basketball games during the school year.

Most don't realize the effort and the commitment it takes to be a part of the Carterville Lions Cheer team. They practice or participate in cheer camps eleven months of the year. They put in hour after hour after hour of practice time that no one but their coaches and their parents know happen. They deal with injuries, bumps bruises, fractures and the emotions of being exhausted but knowing there is still more improvement needed. And ALL of the practice and work comes down to these next two weeks.

These young ladies do cheer their hearts out for our football and basketball teams all year long. They make the long bus trips to and from the events just like the players themselves. But more than likely they have also just practiced for two to three hours before that game or they may stay for an hour after they get home so they can "run through it one more time".

I just wanted to say thank you for all you do. You are the carriers of school spirit are the heart of Carterville Lions pride. Good Luck this weekend! #LionPride.

I highly encourage you to take a couple of hours out of your Saturday Morning and make a quick trip up to Troy Triad to see our ladies perform and cheer them on just like they do for us during our games.

I have taken the liberty to provide a map with the directions to Troy Triad. The weather is supposed to be sunny on Saturday.

Luke Ford Continues To Receive Scholarship Offers

It is good to be Luke Ford these days. Not only is Luke having a very good season on the basketball court for the Lions, at the same time he is having a fantastic football off-season in the college football recruiting game.

I told you a couple weeks back that "Superman" had the unique opportunity to participate in the U.S. Army All-American Combine in San Antonio, Texas.

Well since then, things have gotten incredibly interesting. He had already received a scholarship offer from SIU, which is appropriate as his brother Noah already attends and plays for Nick Hill and the SIU Saluki's. But this week, Luke received scholarship offers from Arkansas and Oklahoma State...both on the same day.

Statistics show there are over 25, 000 public secondary education schools in the United States. I'm not sure how many of these schools have football teams, yet alone the number of high school football players there are in the U.S. I do know that The U.S. Army All-American Combine bring together the top 600 high school football players from around the country and Carterville's Luke Ford is getting very high praise from those that saw him work out at this event.

Luke has received three offers so far, but there is every reason to believe there could be many more offers made in the next year to Mr. Ford. Hopefully, this week I will have the opportunity to sit down with Luke and talk with him about the recruiting efforts that are under way now.

Congrats Luke! #LionPride

Carterville Booster Club Member Appreciation Night This Saturday

This Saturday night during the boys basketball game with Benton, booster club current members will have free admission to the game and refreshments will be served during the JV game that starts at 6:15 in the main gym.

Our booster club does a fantastic job of taking care of the high school and junior high sports teams with the extras that pop up during a season. From news uniforms to various pieces of equipment that are needed and other needs that are too numerous to mention. Needless to say, they quietly work, usually with little or no recognition, with our athletic department. Thank you for everything that you do!

So as you can see, there was a lot going on this past week. Winter sports are in the home stretch and spring sports will be in full swing before you know it.

Thanks for listening....and #LetsGoLions