Junior Bobcats enjoy outstanding season

The Berryville junior high school boys basketball team recently finished up a 22-5 season that included the school’s first outright regular-season conference championship since 2020.

“They had a fantastic year,” said coach Cody Curtis. “One of the best in recent memory, for sure.”

The Junior Bobcats relied on a balanced offensive attack throughout the season, with the starting five of CT Hicks, Carson McMellon, John Butler, Hudson Norris and Mason Zogleman all capable of scoring in double digits on a given night.

“That’s kind of what we stressed from the summer on,” Curtis said. “We knew we had enough guys that could score. It was just getting them to be confident enough and buy in with each other and share it enough. When you do that, you create a lot of problems for teams to guard.”

A good example came in a 42-38 overtime victory over Prairie Grove on Feb. 3 that clinched the outright conference title. Zogleman scored eight points, including a crucial three-pointer in overtime, to go along with 11 points from Butler and 10 from Hicks.

“Prairie Grove ran a triangle and two on our two leading scorers, and it didn’t really matter,” Curtis said. “Mason Zogleman stepped up and hit two or three threes and the other kids that weren’t being face-guarded stepped up and made some big buckets. That made the difference late in the year for us.”

Several of the freshmen could compete for starting roles on the high school team next season “I’d put money on three of them for sure,” Curtis said. “We’ll see. You never know who’s going to grow and mature and who’s going to put in the extra time and that kind of stuff. But they’re going to help big-time, for sure.”

Meanwhile, a talented group of seventh- graders will wait their turn after completing a 17-1 season in which they also won a conference championship.

“They’re a real high-IQ group,” Curtis said. “They’re not the biggest or the most athletic, but they’re really high-IQ.”