Following a dominating 46-25 victory over rival Chillicothe in the Class 3, District 14 championship game on Friday at Higginsville, the Trenton High School girls basketball team lingered on the court as their family, friends and fans spilled onto the floor for hugs, photo opportunities and general celebration of the team’s second district crown in three years.
Trenton Head Coach Brian Upton, knowing the boys district championship was still to come, surveyed the scene. He briefly pondered getting the court cleared until he spotted the clock on the scoreboard still showing 42 minutes before the start of the boys’ game.
“I guess we’ve still got some time,” he said.
So the celebration continued.
Upton knows the importance of these wins, more so this season than in any other. The Bulldogs have as good of a mix of players as they could hope for this season and it has led them to a 24-0 record, a number-two ranking in the state polls, a Grand River Conference championship and, now, a district championship.
Five seniors – veterans of two state final four runs, one in basketball and one in softball – are playing their final season as a group after a decade of calling one another teammates. This season represents the final chapter that they will co-write before going on to college athletics at separate schools. For the program, it’s almost impossible to imagine a similar run of success to what this group has put together over the past four years coming down the pipe anytime in the foreseeable future.
Everyone involved with this team is in the same boat.
So when the opportunity to capture a district title, slay an old rival and keep this train on the tracks for at least four more days came around, Trenton made it count.
“I knew tonight, when we got here, that there was intensity in the air,” Upton said. They were fired up. They were excited, but they were focused and I think you saw that the whole game.”
Trenton came out with a stifling defense and gave Chillicothe’s offense a nearly impossible task. The Bulldogs limited the Hornets to just two points in the first quarter, eight in the second and four in the third. Through the first three frames combined, Chillicothe scored a field goal inside the three-point line just twice. When Trenton began to cycle starters out of the game midway through the fourth quarter, Chillicothe had just 14 points on the scoreboard.
“It was just smothering,” Upton said of his defense. “We did a lot of scouting. We were watching film and looking for anything that we hadn’t seen, so we were really prepared. It had to be frustrating for the girls on the other team. Every time they made a pass it was contested, every time they made a pass into the post there were two defenders. We just did an outstanding job. There was a lot of communication, there was a lot of help and tonight we were just spot on.”
Chillicothe would hit two three-pointers late in the fourth quarter and added a couple of other points late to pull their total to 25 for the game. Even with the late run, Chillicothe’s total was still by far a season low and the game marked the first time all season the Hornets had been held to fewer than 30 points.
“The key was just to get up in them, because they aren’t used to pressure, then force them left – that’s what my mentality is,” Trenton’s Mykah Hurley said of Bulldog defensive game plan. Hurley finished the game with four steals.
Trenton’s offense proved equally as frustrating for the Hornets. The Bulldogs were an incredible seven-for-nine from three-point land as Salem Croy, Ainsley Tolson and Mykah Hurley all got their shots in on the Hornets. Croy and Hurley led the way with 11 points apiece and Tolson followed with 10. Tolson added five rebounds, five assists and two steals while Hurley came up with four assists to go with her four steals.
Croy, who was sidelined with an injury when Trenton won its district title in 2017, made her presence felt early. She knocked down a three for Trenton’s first points of the game, then drove to the hoop for a contested layup that pushed her total and the team’s score to five.
“Before the game I was insanely nervous to the point where Ainsley had to give me a hug and tell me ‘it’s going to be okay’,” Croy said. “I think just having my team tell me we can do this triggered something. I’m pretty sure I haven’t shot a layup or an inside shot in three games. I was just trying to do whatever I could for my team.”
When Chillicothe ventured out to take three-point looks away, it was Maci Moore finding success inside. She finished with nine points, five rebounds and blocked four shots. Trenton also got four points, nine rebounds and two assists from Sidney Lynch and a free throw by Lexi Whitaker rounded out the Trenton total.
“The beauty of this team is that there are weapons everywhere,” Upton said. “You can kind of pick your poison. If you want to try and slow down Ainsley or Maci, Salem and Mykah are plenty talented to go put up 10, 15 or 20 points and they do. Everyone on this team is willing to contribute whatever that night provides.”
Trenton led 16-10 late in the second quarter before closing the half on an 11-0 run, highlighted by three-pointers from both Hurley and Croy. At the break Trenton’s lead had grown to 27-10. With the way Trenton’s defense dominated the game, the Bulldogs had more points at halftime than Chillicothe finished the game with.
Trenton never looked back, leading 29-14 after three quarters and twice pushing the lead to as many as 29 points in the fourth before taking the district title by the 21-point margin in the end.
“This team all year has kind of had that one two or three minute spurt where the game goes from us being five or six points ahead to 15 or 18 ahead,” Upton said. “I told the girls ‘this is going to be a game of runs and we need to hit ours and not let them have theirs.’ We hit ours right before halftime; we never let them have that opportunity to get more than three or four points in a row.”
Trenton will now travel to sectionals, where the Bulldogs will face Monroe City – the District 13 champion – in Moberly at 8:15 p.m. on Wednesday.
“We’re going to stay focused on the next game,” Tolson said. “We really want to go back to state, but you have to take it one game at a time. We’re going to keep working hard together and keep being the best teammates that we can be for each other.”