Kennett

KENNETT – An early collection of runs gave the Kennett softball team the cushion needed to down Holcomb 22-12 at home Monday, March 27, 2023. The Indians racked up 12 runs in the first inning, all of which were kickstarted by a double to center field hit by Hadley Wilson which brought in Lauren Barton and Handley McAtee. ...

KENNETT – The Kennett baseball team picked up its first SEMO Conference win of the season with a 7-0 shutout over the Cape Central Tigers at home Monday, March 27, 2023. “We're off to a good start,” Kennett coach Aaron New said. “The key to the game today was Ashton Williams. He had a great pitching performance and Trey Gardner came in and closed the door. Offensively, our at bats got better as the game went on, so it was a good day to get our first SEMO Conference win of the year.”...

Veteran Southeast Missouri State football coach Tom Matukewicz didn’t necessarily plan on having to utilize Redhawk true freshman outside linebacker Latrevion Thompson last fall. However, injuries, as well as Thompson showing some potential, forced the Redhawk coaches' hands, and the former Kennett High School standout ultimately participated in five games.

Winter sports have come to an end in Southeast Missouri and for many of the schools in the area, successful seasons. New Madrid County Central won the Class 3 State Championship and the Notre Dame girls and Jackson boys each captured fourth in the state in Class 5 and 6, respectively...

KENNETT – Dexter High School came out on top of the Kennett Quad golf tournament Wednesday, March 22, 2023. On Kennett Country Club's course with a par of 36, Dexter's Alyssa Warren medaled for the Bearcats with a two-over score of 38. With a team score of 164, she was followed by Tucker Temples with 42, Ben Christian with 43, Banks Nesselrodt with 45, Carter Stone with 41 and Ethan Zabelin with 64...

BENTON, Mo. — Kennett defeated Kelly 8-0 on Saturday, March 18 to spoil the Hawks' (0-1) season opener. Matthew Gardner earned the win for the Indians (3-0) after pitching four innings and not allowing any runs on one hit with seven strikeouts. Dalton Forck took the loss after four innings and surrendered one earned run on four hits with eight strikeouts...

EAST PRAIRIE, Mo. — The season got off to a rocky start as the East Prairie softball team committed six errors in a 13-2 loss to Kennett. “We hung with them for a while, but couldn't get the offense going,” said East Prairie coach Jade Marcum. “Then they had a pretty good inning and hits lots of gaps and we couldn't come back unfortunately.”...

KENNETT – Baseball season is officially back, despite the fact that the weather hasn’t yet caught up. While fans huddled in blankets at Indian Park Friday night, the Kennett baseball team started its season on a high note with a 7-0 victory over Brookland High School...

KENNETT – Not many teams can boast a run at the state championship in six of the last eight years, and it certainly can't be done without finding the balance of playing “in the now” and developing young athletes along the way. Luckily for the youthful 2023 Kennett softball team, player development has become something of a science...

KENNETT – With a state championship win in 2021 and a third place win last year, there's plenty of excitement surrounding the Kennett baseball program. While the Indians graduated four of their best players last Spring, however, the goal now is to get the pieces in place quickly in order to make another trip to Springfield...

DEXTER — Second-seeded Saxony Lutheran (13-12) pushed through a close matchup to rally in the fourth quarter and take down sixth-seeded Kennett (18-10) in the Class 4 District 1 semifinals at Deter High School Thursday, March 2. The Crusaders won by 17 points, 56-39, but Kennett led after the first quarter and the two teams were tied at halftime and at the end of the third...

DEXTER — The sixth-seeded Kennett Lady Indians held strong through a low-scoring first half to launch a comeback and defeat third-seeded Fredericktown 57-55 in the Class 4 District 1 quarterfinals. “It just showed our toughness, and we've shown it all year long,” Kennett coach Aaron New said. “We were down 14 at halftime, then we had a 23-4 quarter in the third quarter, but then we lost the lead again. Our toughness was able to find a way to win the game with a couple good rebounds.”...

DEXTER – It’s been a mixed bag of a 2022-23 season for the Kennett High School boy’s basketball program. On one hand, the Indians improved from five to eight wins under first-year coach Noll Billings. However, on the other hand, Billings’ team had dropped eight of its final nine regular-season games, as it headed into Monday’s MSHSAAA Class 4 District 1 game with Fredericktown at the Bearcat Event Center at Dexter.

KENNETT – Daniel Boatman, senior running back for the Kennett Indians football team, committed to continue his academic and athletic career at Culver-Stockton College in Canton, Mo., Tuesday, February 28. “Just to see that I can have an opportunity to do what I love best, it's a dream to just go to the next level and take it step by step,” Boatman said. “I'm just going to keep grinding and hopefully get to a bigger level.”...

DEXTER — The season has taken two different paths for the girls basketball teams at Doniphan and Dexter. This winter, both teams started off hot heading into the Twin Rivers Lady Royals Christmas Classic. Dexter entered the fray 6-1, won its first two round games, and then dropped tough decisions to a pair of quality teams in East Carter and Neelyville...

KENNETT — Kennett (17-9) and Poplar Bluff (12-14) girls met up for both teams’ final regular season game of the season Thursday night. However, the contest was less about adding a win to their season records and more about conditioning and maintaining form in anticipation of district tournaments next week...

By ALAN DALE Sports Editor Once again, the Dexter Bearcats will play host to a district tournament — but this time there is a familiar face that is missing from the equation. When the top-seeded Bearcats host the Class 4 District 1 tournament beginning Monday, Dexter (18-8) will aim to get into the sectional round after falling in the district final game three straight years to New Madrid County Central. ...

PARK HILLS, Missouri — The Park Hills Central Rebels and the Poplar Bluff Mules combined to score 177 points Thursday night. Unfortunately for the visiting Mules, they came out on the short end of a 96-81 decision at the hand of one of the best teams in Class 4...

SIKESTON — A strong start and a dominant inside presence was all Kennett needed to spoil Sikeston’s senior night with a 63-48 win Tuesday night. Sikeston missed their first eight shots and Kennett took advantage, jumping out to a 13-0 lead to start the game...

VAN BUREN — The fourth-seeded Van Buren Bulldogs defeated fifth-seeded Cabool 44-32 in a thrilling matchup in the first round of the Class 2 District 2 Tournament Monday night. “We were excited to get on the court and grind it out.” said Van Buren’s Benjamin Hawkins. “The team was the reason we won. We kept each other up and we’re at a point in our season where we finally found our chemistry.”...

Postseason wrestling is one of my favorite high school events to cover for Semoball. I usually go to more than one of these tournaments on a single day. This past Saturday, I started the Class 3 District 1 tourney in Farmington and finished at the Class 2 District 1 tourney in Ste. Genevieve...

New Madrid County Central took home the Class 1 District 1 title, finishing with 181.0 points, firmly defeating Valle Catholic in second place at 152.5. The Eagles got first-place wins from Caleb Moore (106), Devin Rowe (144), Gavyn Colbert (150), Connor Henderson (175) and Ty Blakey (190), while Tharon Harper (third, 113) and Christian Williams (third, 157) both advanced to the state championships after finishing on the podium in their respective weight classes...

KENNETT — Cape Central (23-1) rolled into Kennett (8-16) Friday and left very little on the court in the Tigers’ 92-50 rout over the Indians. “I don’t know if we guarded as well as we have,” Cape Central head coach Drew Church said. “We gave up too many straight-line drives, but for the most part a lot of guys got to play, we did some good things, we were unselfish so for the most part we’re happy. ...

The Poplar Bluff Lady Mules have been on a tear the past three games but got stopped in their tracks by a hungry Kennett team, who's been searching for a win themselves. The Kennett Lady Indians (14-9) started the game hot and ended it in the same fashion with a 49-44 win over Poplar Bluff...

ELLSINORE — The East Carter Lady Redbirds got 29 points from Brooklyn Kearbey and took a resounding 68-46 victory over the Class 4 Kennett Lady Indians Monday night “Kennett is a more physical team than we’re used to and that’s something we need to get better at playing through,” said East Carter coach Angela Rodgers. “It was not one of our smoothest games, but I’m proud that we didn’t roll over.”...

DEXTER – Friday night got off to a poor start for Dexter High School senior guard Cole Nichols.

For the Dexter High School varsity boy’s basketball squad, the lesson learned this week is that sleeping is optional, and effort on the court is definitely not.

KENNETT – Despite producing what Kennett head coach Aaron New called "our best effort to date," the Lady Indians fell to Saxony Lutheran High School 50-44 Thursday on Kennett's senior night. Lady Crusaders' junior guard Rebecca Johnson took the ball at tip-off and drew first blood, only to be answered in quick succession by Kennett senior guard Lani Heeb with a three-point mortar and Kennett junior Jayla Moore who sank a quick bucket to go ahead early in the game...

The Poplar Bluff Mules have struggled to stay on the winning side for most of the season. That ended Wednesday with a strong performance agains the visiting Kennett Indians. After a week off of the hardwood, and two weeks since their Homecoming Night game against Kennett was postponed due to a winter storm, the Mules picked up right where they left off with an 81-52 win...

The Kennett wrestling team came to the Cape Central quad on Tuesday and swept the final three duel meets of the season to set a new school record with 13 duel wins. “Coming into this meet we were three away and we had three duels left,” Kennett head coach Jacob Whittle said,” So I told them if we sweep today we break our school record, and they came out and got it done.”...

Kennett (8-12) started their senior night game against Senath-Hornersville (14-8) on the right track and managed to hold off attempts of a Lion comeback to secure a 56-53 victory Tuesday night. Bottom line, Kennett forced Senath-Hornersville into “playing Kennett Indian basketball,” which sped up the game and prevented the Lions from finding their rhythm until the end...

CAPE GIRARDEAU — The Dexter wrestling team went 1-2 in the Cape Central quad meet on Tuesday with a win over Notre Dame and losses against Cape Central and Kennett. Despite the results, head coach Cody Boyer was pleased with how the Bearcats competed overall...

A common theme all season long for the Cape Central Tigers has been senior leadership and that proved to be the case again as the Tigers blew by the Kennett Indians 60-25 on Monday at Cape Central High School. Cape Central honored four seniors in Ki Bogan, Taylor Horton, Keri Williams and Grace Patrick...

The week-long break between games for the Greenville boys basketball team hardly phased the Bears as they powered past Kennett Saturday in a rescheduled matchup that was postponed due to winter weather earlier this week. “We’ve had a pretty good year so far,” Greenville head coach Nathan Walk said. ...

KENNETT — The Malden Green Wave survived an onslaught of massive momentum swings and three-straight quarters of Kennett leads to claim a hard-fought 87-82 victory on the road going into the Bootheel Conference Tournament as the No. 1 seed. Malden’s win was more important to the team than usual after falling to New Madrid County Central in a crushing 57-78 loss on Tuesday, and they played as such...

The Bootheel Conference basketball tournament is here again and the Malden Green Wave are the top seed heading into the event which begins 10:15 a.m. Saturday with the first of three first-round games taking place at Hayti, the site of the competition...

KENNETT — Notre Dame (12-1) rolled into Kennett (13-6) Monday night and left nothing up to chance as they ended the Indians’ 10-game winning streak with a resounding 41-14 victory. Wasting absolutely no time, Notre Dame’s press kicked in immediately as they held Kennett scoreless for five minutes and forced turnover after turnover while eliminating their own, which Bulldog head coach Kirk Boeller explained has been an issue and a priority for the team recently...

Oak Ridge (7-9) celebrated a record-breaking win on Monday night, taking down Charleston (1-10) by a 62-34 margin to open the Scott-Mississippi Conference Tournament. The win breaks the Bluejay program record for wins in a season, previously set at six in 2021...

There’s playing hurt, and then there is wrestling hurt. Jackson senior Gavin Hicks left the consolation semifinal match of the SEMO Conference Tournament on Saturday at the Tiger Field House defeated and injured. As he was treated for injuries both upper and lower, the pain in his face was palpable. Entering the fifth-place match with the district tournament mere weeks away, it would make sense for Hicks to call it a day and heal his wounds...

KENNETT – The Kennett Lady Indians basketball program (13-5) experienced the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat at home Thursday night after facing off against two different teams in one night. Kennett's junior varsity team took a shellacking from Jackson, falling 54-25, while the varsity squad stood strong against the Twin Rivers Lady Royals (8-9) to win 36-28, picking up the varsity team’s tenth-straight win along the way...

CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. — The Sikeston boys wrestling split a pair of matches during a triangular meet at Notre Dame on Tuesday, Jan. 17. The Bulldogs fell 42-39 to Kennett after Kevin Thompson secured the victory with a pin of Kobe Bryant at the heavyweight division...

A deeply contested meet between Kennett and Sikeston on Tuesday in Notre Dame High School came down to the heavyweight bout. Fortunately for the Indians, head coach Jacob Whittle’s final card to play was also his best wrestler. “Kevin Thompson saved the day,” Whittle said. “I asked him to go out there and pin the kid and he did just that.”...

JACKSON, Mo. — The Jackson Indians held the Poplar Bluff Mules scoreless from the field in the opening period to build up a big early lead on the way to a 67-47 win Tuesday night in SEMO Conference action. Jackson led 14-1 after the opening period, but the Mules (6-8) cut it to 28-20 by halftime. However, Poplar Bluff could get no closer the rest of the way and Jackson outscored the Mules 39-27 after halftime...

Kicking off a stretch of three games in three days while battling “the injury bug,” the Kennett girls basketball team (11-5) has now won eight games in a row with the team’s 47-36 victory over Holcomb (6-9) Tuesday night. “We knew it would be a battle,” Kennett head coach Aaron New said. ...

Notre Dame entered the week installing a new offense designed to turn the Bulldogs’ season around. Friday’s game against Kennett was predictably rough, but the Bulldogs prevailed 67-57 at Notre Dame Regional High School. “Anytime you switch things up in the middle of a season, it’s gonna be tough,” Notre Dame head coach Paul Unterreiner said...

KENNETT – Kennett High School hosted Dexter and Valley View, Arkansas, at the Kennett Tri Thursday night for senior night and the school’s only home meet this season. Celebrating one of the largest senior classes in the school’s history, the night began with the Indians defeating Dexter 45-27...

The Kennett Indians (6-8) ended a four-game losing streak Tuesday night in the team’s second upset over Bernie (9-4) at home after successfully contending with the Mules’ impressive long range shooting game. Putting up over 80 points against Bernie once again, Kennett won 81-66...

On a night when the man who gave birth to the Poplar Bluff wrestling program, Terry Smith, was honored with induction to the program’s ring of honor, the Mules played host to Notre Dame and Kennett and made sure to put on quite the exclamation point to further illustrate how important the sport has become in town...

The Kennett girls basketball team (9-5) is now on a six-game winning streak after defeating Dexter (9-5) with a continuously improving and imposing defense at home Monday night.  “That’s a very good team and we were just able to hang in there and hold on to win,” Kennett head coach Aaron New said. “I thought the key to the game for us was our half court defense and rebounding. We pressed early and we were good tonight defensively.”...