Holt Makes It A Clean Sweep Over Timberland At Wentzville-Area Pink Night High School Hoops Celebration

On a night when it seemed the entire community came out to celebrate breast cancer awareness and the steady progress of the local high school hoops programs, the host Indians enjoyed the most fun of all Thursday night, by nabbing wins for both its boys and girls varsity basketball teams over archrival , in front of a packed to the rafters crowd at the Holt High School Gymnasium.  

The celebration was dubbed “Pink Night” at Holt High, with nearly everyone wearing the color pink to recognize breast cancer awareness, and students and volunteers from both high schools selling T-shirts, baked goods, and raffle tickets in order to raise money for the Susan G. Komen Foundation – an organization that’s raised nearly $2 billion in its history for cancer research.

But on Thursday, “Pink Night” also became sweep night, as the Lady Indians won a last-minute nail-biter 42-37 over the visiting Wolves, then watched as the Holt boys blew right by Timberland’s boys for a one-sided 71-42 win in the nightcap.

“It is a great night for everyone at Holt,” Indians girls basketball coach Rich Binning said, after taking an emotional moment to think of his father, who passed away earlier this year. “The girls just played great, and I’m just so proud of every last one of them.

“We wanted to surpass last year’s win total of five, and we did that tonight. We got our sixth win tonight, and that’s special to me.”

And incredibly, the Indians have done it with six straight wins in the month of December, including thrilling home wins over and , and a pair of rugged road victories at Ritenour and at .

“It’s all credit to the girls,” Binning said. “The girls are starting to believe in themselves, and they’re sticking together as a team. Bree Rigg and Julie Buckles have been hanging tough inside, and our shooters came out and hit some big shots. I’m just thrilled.”

Holt senior Brianne Rigg led all scorers on Thursday with 20 points and a game-high 12 rebounds.

Rigg scored 13 of her points in a first half, when Holt only managed 17 points total. But she also made the biggest play of the night, when she powered in a short jumper and drew a foul with just over a minute left in the game, for a three-point play that gave the Indians some breathing room late in the game.

“Our assistant coach Cortney Knaust, she really did a wonderful job with our forwards this week,” Binning said. “I know they’re both six-foot, but sometimes height is a luxury, not a necessity, but they’re figuring out what to do with that tool that they have.”

Lost in the excitement of Holt’s thrilling victory was just how close Timberland came to stealing it away.

The Wolves lost the lead in the second quarter, and never led again, but pulled to within two points five times in the fourth quarter, and had the ball with the chance to tie or take the lead three times.

Unfortunately for Timberland though, it just never could get that basket to tie the score.

“We all knew that going into this game that Holt was not the same team we played two games into the season (which Timberland won 57-50),” Wolves basketball coach Hayley Leake said. “They have gotten better as a group, and probably more than any other team I have ever seen at this time of the year.”

Senior Taleisha Hart had 12 points to lead the Wolves in scoring, but she also had a critical turnover with 15.4 seconds left that effectively ended any shot at a Timberland comeback, as it gave the ball back to Holt, who then ran out the clock for the win.

“It’s a hard loss to take,” Leake said, “because I really felt like players stepped up when they needed to. Sometimes it worked for us, sometimes it didn’t. But overall, I really do believe my girls worked hard. They just made a few more plays than we did tonight.”

Both teams are off until after Christmas, but will play a rubber match in the first round of the St. Dominic Tournament, on Tuesday, Dec. 27, at in O’Fallon, with the opening tip-off set for noon.

“It should be a great game and a great tournament,” Binning said. “We’re looking forward to it.”

The boys basketball nightcap between the two schools began almost exactly opposite to the girls game, as Timberland had a great start, and jumped out to a nice early lead.

But that advantage was short-lived, as Holt roared back from an early eight-point deficit to outscore the Wolves 18-6 in second quarter to grab a 30-22 edge by halftime.

In the third quarter though, is when Holt really took control of the ballgame, using its full-court press defense to near-perfection to outscore Timberland 23-7, and take a 53-29 lead heading into the fourth quarter.

From that point on, the Indians cruised to its second-most lopsided win of the year (on Dec. 1, Holt beat Jennings 75-37), and improved to 4-3 on the season.

Timberland fell to 3-5, and will go into the holiday break having lost four of its last five.

Once the holiday passes, both teams will be in action at the St. Dominic Tournament, with first round games on Tuesday, Dec. 27.

Timberland will open up tournament play at 3 p.m. that afternoon, against undefeated , which is ranked No. 10 in the area among large school boys basketball teams, while Holt will begin with a matchup at 6 p.m. that evening, against Ft. Zumwalt West.

The winners of those contests will advance to the tournament semifinals on Wednesday, Dec. 28, with the third-place and championship games set for next Friday, Dec. 30.