Olney Central (90) Illinois Prep (76) - Friday, January 22nd
The Blue Knights opened up the 2021-2022 campaign with a 90-76 win over Illinois Prep at The Dungeon on Olney Central College campus. The game between Olney Central and Illinois Prep concluded the first night of the 2021 Rotary Classic. The Blue Knights got a hot start from returning 6'5" Sophomore Cobie Montgomery as he buried three-pointers on back to back possessions to gain a 6-2 edge. Olney Central would be in control the rest of the half and came into the intermission with a 50-34 lead. On the first offensive possession of the second half, Montgomery caught a lob pass from 6'3" Freshman guard Jordan Graham and flushed it home to extend the lead to 18. Illinois Prep immediately responded with a layup. The made three-pointer by Elijah Farr at the 16:55 mark expanded the Blue Knights lead to 21. The ensuing possession the Blue Knights defense got a stop and Cobie Montgomery sank a pair of free throws after being fouled attempting a finish at the rim. The made free throws extended the lead to 25, the largest Olney Central would have for the night.
The Blue Knights and Illinois Prep traded buckets for much of the second half until Illinois Prep went on a run to cut the lead to 8 with 3:30 left on a made three-pointer by Yacouba Traore. Neither team scored until the 2:10 mark when returning Sophomore CE Talton made a layup off an assist from sophomore Elijah Farr. DJ Haynes capped of the scoring with his dunk with 10 seconds remaining.
Olney Central had 5 players in double figures scoring led by Farr (20), CE Talton (17), JJ Kalakon (15), Cobie Montgomery (12), and Jordan Graham (11).
Olney Central (62) Parkland College (82) - Saturday, January 23rd
Less than 24 hours later, the Blue Knights fell to the Parkland College Cobras in the final game of the Rotary Classic. Both teams came out hot to start as Olney Central built a 16-13 lead seven minutes into the game through points in the paint. At the 8:39 mark the Cobras took a 21-20 lead on a Jordan Burge three-pointer from the left corner. The next possession Parkland was able to force a Blue Knights turnover and convert the transition layup for a quick 5-0 run to take a 23-20 lead.
The next basket would not come until the 6:31 mark on a Jordan Graham transition layup to narrow the Cobras lead to 1 point (23-22). The Cobras responded with a Kelvin Swims traditional three-point play. On the very next possession, Dillon Harrison scored his first career points as a Blue Knight on a made three-pointer from the right corner. Parkland would take control from there as they went on a 15-3 run to finish the half capped off by a made put back layup at the buzzer to create a 41-28 margin going into the locker room.
Olney Central scored on the first possession of the second half on a Jordan Graham made three-pointer. After an exchange of baskets and a CE Talton layup at 18:12 remaining the Cobras would go on a 12-2 run spanning over four minutes to take a 58-35 lead.
The closest the Blue Knights would get from there was a 12 point deficit. Parkland was led by a balanced scoring attack and defeated the Blue Knight on the boards (42-35), turnover margin (15-12), and field goal percentage (48%-32%). Olney Central was led in scoring by Elijah Farr (13), DJ Haynes (11), and Jordan Graham (9).
Olney Central plays Illinois Prep at home Wednesday, January 27th at 7:00 PM.
Head Coach Casey Wyllie on the weekend: "We want to thank everyone for making the Richland County Rotary Classic a success. Thank you to everyone for tuning in online, but we really missed our fans in the stands. We were very thankful for the opportunity to play this weekend. It was good for our guys to finally be able to play a couple of games after being in the gym since August. A split this weekend is not what we wanted, but we will learn from our mistakes and get better."