Lady Cats Play With Seven Players Due to Quarantines In Loss To Trinity

Girls Fall 53-25 To Lady Raiders

Cariann Williams puts up a shot against Trinity in a 53-25 Edmonson loss.

Darren Doyle, story: Madison Doyle, photos:
The Edmonson County Lady Cats struggled  Friday night against the Trinity Lady Raiders in a 53-25 loss with only seven players as virus quarantines proved to play a big part in the District 12 match.

With 13 players on the roster being out due to COVID protocols, the Lady Cats were extremely short-handed. With one starter and most all bench players out, Edmonson County players didn't have much time for breaks. 

Hallie Cassady tries to get a shot off against a Trinity defender.

Edmonson County shot as poorly in the first half as they have in years, hitting only 3 of 26 shots for a mere 12% from the field. Things didn't get much better in the second half as the girls were unable to generate any more offense. They shot 17% (8-48) for the game.

Paige Wolfe drives the offense against a Lady Raider defender.

Coach Bart Weaver alluded that he disagreed with the quarantine policy when the comment was made after the game that he did about all he could do with the shortened roster and the tough situation.

"I'm going to try to bite my lip a little bit on our quarantine procedures," he said. "I'm gonna have to bite my lip, but yeah, I agree, it's tough. We didn't make shots. You can't win when you shoot 17%. We had a lot of girls out that play a lot of minutes, but we had four starters, so there's no excuse for that."

The Edmonson County school district implemented a board-approved COVID policy that includes quarantines at the beginning of the school year that they said are based on KDE and local health department guidance. Superintendent Brian Alexander said that when it comes to a situation like this, there are no good options.

"No one hates it anymore than I do," he said. "It's hard on our kids, our teams, and our coaches, but we try to look at it from every angle."

Lily Jayne Vincent drives the lane against Trinity.

Quarantines or not, Coach Weaver had the option of cancelling last night's game; if so, it would have been a COVID forfeiture loss, as per KHSAA regulations. He said he would've played the game and at least tried to win, even if he'd only had five players.

"I'm not taking a forfeit," he said. "It's a district game, you know."

Edmonson County was led in scoring by 8th grader Cariann Williams, who had 7 points and 12 rebounds. Paige Wolfe added 6 points, Hallie Cassady had 4 points and 7 rebounds, Julie Norris added 3 points in her varsity debut, Maham Shahbaz also had 3, and Lily Jayne Vincent added 2.

Edmonson County is now 6-10 on the season. They are scheduled to travel to Green County on Monday for a JV/V game.