By Michael Lindsay

The Livingston Academy Wildcats and Lady Wildcats opened their week with a pair of wins Monday night as they swept Clinton in non-district action. The Lady Wildcats opened with a 71-48 victory followed by a 40-39 win by the boys.

Girls

Ellie Butler led all scorers with 31 points and 7 rebounds Monday evening as Livingston Academy (4-2) defeated the Clinton Lady Dragons (1-4), 71-48.

“I liked the pace of our game, but didn’t like all the turnovers,” said Livingston head coach Lesley Riddle. “We’re still pretty raw and making mistakes.”

Cora Copeland tacked on 12 points and 7 boards for the Lady Wildcats.

Livingston opened the contest hot as they outscored Clinton 17-2 in the first quarter. The Lady Dragons found their rhythm offensively in the second quarter as they posted 18 points in the frame to trail Livingston at halftime, 35-18.

Butler posted 15 first-half points as six different Lady Wildcats found the bottom of the net in the opening two quarters.

“We’ve been trying to get some other people to step up and score along with Ellie,” said Riddle. “We’ve been trying to get other people some minutes without her on the floor, because we may have a game where she gets in foul trouble and we need to do something.”

The Lady Wildcats kept control of the contest in the third period as an Allie Reams buzzer-beating layup gave Hogeye a 55-33 lead entering the fourth quarter.

Clinton didn’t go away quietly as they opened the fourth quarter on a 13-2 run to cut their deficit to 11 points (57-46) with 3:59 remaining.

“We changed defenses and Clinton did a good job of knocking down three-pointers,” said Riddle. “We needed to change back and quit taking quick shots on offense. It was a quick adjustment.”

The Lady Dragons got no closer as Livingston closed out the contest on a 14-2 run over the final 3:59 to win by a 71-48 final score.

Livingston improves to 4-2 overall and takes more than a week off before hosting Clay County next Tuesday.

“We’ll go back to the fundamentals this week,” said Riddle. “We’re still missing a lot of layups and trying to play fast but not turn it over.”

Boys

The Livingston Academy Wildcats led for a total of 2 minutes and 23 seconds Monday evening, but that’s all they needed to erase a 10-point fourth-quarter deficit and earn a 40-39 victory over the Clinton Dragons.

“The only way we were able to win that game was being resilient,” said Livingston head coach Jimmy Miller. “Our young guys finally figured out how to win tonight. That was a tough one; we were outmatched athletically and size-wise. We had a lot of trouble scoring and they were one of the better defensive teams we’ve seen all year.”

Junior forward Rocco Carwile led the Wildcats with 16 points, 13 of which came in the second half.

“Rocco’s been thrown in the fire a little bit,” said Miller. “In the first half he struggled a little, but in the second half he came out and kept competing for us and chipped away at them. He’s a big reason we were able to turn that around.”

Cole Harris tacked on 11 points along with 7 from Tucker Miller.

“Our young ball handlers struggled with them some,” said Miller. “But that was great for us to see; our district opponents are going to be super strong and super well-coached, so hopefully this helps prepare us for that.”

Clinton controlled the early portions of Monday’s game as they jumped out to a 13-3 lead late in the first quarter and held a 13-7 advantage entering the second.

A Carwile transition layup cut Livingston’s deficit to 13-9 before the Dragons reeled off 6 straight points to go back ahead 19-9 with 5:40 left in the second quarter. Clinton took a 25-14 advantage into the locker room at halftime.

Livingston cut Clinton’s lead to 6 points (28-22) late in the third period before the Dragons extended their advantage back to double digits at 32-22 entering the fourth quarter.

Carwile opened the fourth with a three-pointer to pull LA within 7 points at 32-25. Clinton led 39-34 with 3:49 remaining until a Cole Harris backdoor layup followed by a pair of Carwile free throws gave Livingston their first lead of the evening at 40-39 with 2:23 remaining.

Neither team would find the bottom of the net for the game’s final 2:23 as Livingston held on to win by a 40-39 final margin.

“Our guys do a good job at controlling the basketball,” said Miller. “We wanted to keep them in front of us in the full court and make them work for tough shots.”

Livingston improves to 6-1 overall and will take more than a week off before hosting Clay County next Tuesday.