By Kyle Roberts
High school basketball stories should never be about officiating.
But it was hard not to acknowledge the constant start-and-stop of a night of whistles echoing through Memorial Gym on the campus of Louisiana Tech University on Tuesday.
Thankfully for the Ruston High Bearcats (13-7), their winning streak will stay intact after winning 80-65 over the Arcadia Hornets.
“The guys battled,” Ruston High head coach Ryan Bond said. “The officiating was questionable, to say the least. I’ve been around basketball for a long time. And that was some poor officiating. But our guys battled, and I’m really proud of that fact.
“We overcame some of that. We’re going to have to go on the road maybe in the playoffs, so it’s good that we got some of that adversity now. It’s just unfortunate, because these kids are out here playing hard. There are a lot of good referees in our association, but they weren’t here tonight.”
Ruston fought through the physical battle with the Hornets with the Bearcats being called for 17 personal fouls in the first half alone and would total 30 for the night, giving Arcadia a total of 42 free throw attempts on the night.
Three ‘Cats would ultimately foul out while two Hornets would do the same.
Ruston took a slim 35-32 lead into the halftime locker room, but would be catapulted to the win after freshman Ahmad Hudson scored all of his 21 points in the second half with a couple of highlight-worthy plays including a dunk after rebounding his own missed free throw in traffic.
“Ahmad was hiding behind their press in the first half,” Bond said. “We told him to show himself a little bit more (in the second half), then we moved him in the middle, then we could swing it up to a guard on the wing, and then just dump it down there to him. And then he’s got a layup and dunk fest.”
Ruston will travel to Ouachita to resume district play on Friday, Jan. 26, for a 7 p.m. tipoff. Ouachita swept Ruston in the regular season last year, so the Bearcats will be looking to pick up a big road win.
“They’re really good at home,” Bond said of the Lions. “They’re really well coached. They’ve got pride and they whooped us last year twice. We know we’ve got to be mentally stronger when we go over there.”
