3rd Region Hoops- The Butler County Bears took the beautiful people of Morgantown KY on a ride it’s never been on before. This was a season with great expectations that had been place since they lost to Owensboro on March 4th, 2023 in 3rd Region Final Four. With Briar Griffin electing to transfer back home to join an already stud 25′ class, the expectations only strengthened. Head Coach Calvin Dockery beefed the schedule up heading into the season to better equip his squad. The schedule included trips to the Marshall County Hoopfest, The King of The Bluegrass, an AWAY game VS Warren Central, a McCracken County tournament & more. The Bears would go through the regular season unblemished & in order to do things never done in the schools history, they’d have to go through the Daviess County, Ohio County & Owensboro Catholic, who each rounded out the regions top 4 teams. They passed every test during the Regional Tournament and did so in merely dominating fashion. Butler County Bears are the 2023-24 3rd Region Champs – That’s something you’ve NEVER said before – UNTIL NOW! The Bears, led by the state of Kentucky’s 4th leading scorer made their first ever trip to Rupp Arena to play in the Boys KHSAA Sweet 16; The greatest show in High School Basketball. There they would face the 6th Region Champions, Evangel Christian. In a tightly contested game, a late 2nd QTR run that escorted The Eagles into intermission with a 9 point lead, would prove to be too much for Butler County to overcome. Junior Lawson Rice led the guys from Motown with 19 points & 6 rebounds. Junior wing Justin Castlen finished with 16 points, 10 rebounds and provided BIG TIME buckets in crucial moments that helped the Bears hang around. The story of the game, however, is the struggles of the Motown Backcourt – a factor we wrote in the Game Preview, that would determine the outcome – and that proved true. The Butler County backcourt combined for just 16 points including 0-13 from 3 and had 12 turnovers. That will NOT bode well for ANYONE when the calendar reads March. Especially a team that is heavily reliant on the scoring of Ty Price and the perimeter shot making of Briar Griffin. That performance is something that is highly unlikely to happen again, unfortunately it happened on the States Biggest Stage. Leading up to yesterday, Griffin & Price were playing at an elite level (the entire team was to be completely honest) but the length of Evangel, notably Christian Doerr who was hounding the Bears ball handlers, preventing them from getting into any offensive flow for much of the game. Doerr’s 5 steals to go along with 21 points, 3 rebounds and 5 assists were MASSIVE in The Eagles collecting their first ever win at Rupp, in their first ever trip. It’s simply unfamiliar territory for the 3rd Region to run through Butler County, but this season it did & assuming every member of the 25′ class returns, they’ll be the early favorite to repeat next season. You can call it a failure if you wish, but we believe it’s in fact the exact opposite. This group ran through every opponent in the region from start to finish & put on a very nice performance at Rupp. George Rogers Class Head Coach Josh Cook, who’s team didn’t earn a trip to the state tournament for the 1st time in 4 seasons, was very complimentary of the Bears performance. “It’s hard to get here & the lights not be too bright. Credit to Butler County for coming in & and competing. You can tell they weren’t afraid of the moment & that says a lot about them as competitors.” For this group of young men to put an entire county on their backs & take them places they’ve never been before, you simply can NEVER take away the joy the people of Butler County have felt cheering this team on. Congratulations to everyone in Butler County on a tremendous run, but unfortunately, ALL GOOD THINGS MUST COME TO AN END. What a blast it’s been for the staff at 3rd Region Hoops to cover & we’ll never forget this run. #MotownOnFire