Tigers get blanked in 4th quarter of home loss to red-hot Knights

   Kyle Leafty scored 20 points and grabbed 12 boards before fouling out, but his supporting cast accounted for a total of 16 points and 13 rebounds, as FC High hosted a Nebraska City Lourdes CC team at the wrong time Friday, losing 42-36.
    The red-hot Knights, led by gunner Hayden Miller (3-for-6 from downtown, 14 pts), out-scored FC an eye-opening 9-0 in the final period. FC came up empty on nine field goal attempts in the period and that pulled its shooting numbers to bone-chilling depths. FC was 2-for-10 from the arc and 14-of-45 from the field. Again, aside from Leafty: 6-of-32.
    FC two weeks ago was riding a seven-game winning streak into Maryville, but are currently in the midst of a dreaded slump, having lost four of six. What’s more, FC is approaching arguably its most difficult weekend of the year, as Class B’s Seward and Crete loom large. Friday, a 7-10 Seward team comes to down, the won-loss record is misleading; the Bluejays have faced the state’s best Class B schools, not to mention they went toe-to-toe with Class A Pius before losing by two. They’ve faced 16-1 Aurora, 15-2 Beatrice and 16-1 Southern Valley.
    Crete has, too, though at 12-5 they’ve fared better. Their win include a triple-overtime stunner over Beatrice and they took unbeaten Scotus deep into the fourth before losing. Crete crushed Wahoo by 22 and last weekend lost to Aurora by just three.    
    The Tigers will need more than one guy to produce and they’ll need to shoot it much better than they did Friday in order to avoid prolonging the winter chill. That said, the stretch run of NE City (Feb. 9), HTRS (Feb. 11) and Fairbury (7-10), all at home, should provide FC an opportunity to get traction before subs.