PIKEVILLE, Ky. (WMDJ) – The University of Pikeville men’s basketball team will be hosting an open practice at historic Wayland Gymnasium.

The open practice will be held on Saturday, September 28th 10 a.m. until 12 p.m.

Bears head coach Tigh Compton says the practice will provide area youth, middle school and high school coaches with the opportunity to go behind the scenes of a college practice for the start of the upcoming 2024-2025 season.

Wayland mayor Jerry Fultz says this is a wonderful event for young players to attend as well as the community.

All items of the Mountain Sports Hall of Fame will also be on display for those interested in learning specifically about the history of mountain high school basketball and other sports.

The event is free and open.

The UPIKE coaching staff will be available for a Q&A session after practice.

EASTERN, Ky. (WMDJ) – Sophomore wide receiver Anderson Lauffer caught three touchdown passes leading the Paintsville Tigers to a dominating performance over the Floyd Central Jaguars 46-6 Friday night.

Lauffer caught a total of eight passes for 210 yards receiving, including two screen passes for 40-plus yards that resulted in touchdowns.

Sophomore quarterback Alex Johnson orchestrated a 286-yard night passing through the air on 11 completions out of 14 attempts and a total of four touchdowns thrown.

Parker Helton, another talented sophomore for the Tigers, caught the other Johnson touchdown pass for 44 yards.

Paintsville scored on three of their first four drives of the game to own a 24-0 lead at the half.

Floyd Central opened the third quarter on offense and put together their lone touchdown drive of the night, leaning on senior quarterback Jace Martin’s legs to lead a ground and pound series inside the 10-yard line before sophomore Bailey Evans struck pay dirt from six yards out to pull the Jaguars to within 18-points at 24-6 with 7:06 left in the period.

The Tigers immediately responded with Lauffer’s second of three touchdown catches with 5:22 remaining to push Paintsville out to a 32-6 lead in the third quarter.

Paintsville senior running back Cedric Stewart would score the team’s only rushing touchdown of the game inside the Jaguars 5-yard line with 1:47 left in the third and senior fullback Lucas Howard punched in his fifth-consecutive two-point conversion giving Paintsville a 40-6 lead.

Lauffer would reel in his final touchdown pass of the evening with 8:13 remaining in the fourth quarter to set the game’s final score, 46-6.

Unofficially, Paintsville ran 30 plays for 370 total yards of offense on just over 15-minutes of possession time. Floyd Central ran 59 plays for only 213 total yards of offense with 47-carries for 203 yards rushing and 1-11 passing from Martin for 10 yards. Floyd Central also turned the ball over once.

Paintsville will be at home this Friday, August 30th hosting Paris. Floyd Central will also be at home hosting Leslie County this week.

PHS   -  8  16  16  6 - 46

FCHS -  0    0    6   0 -  6

EASTERN, Ky. (WMDJ) – After winning a combined six games on the field over a four-year span, the Floyd Central Jaguars turned heads in 2023 with a six-win season including a home playoff victory.

Now coach Shawn Hager hopes those past struggles combined with last season’s success will build momentum towards a possible district championship in 2024.

“It depends on how we develop, but we’re not settling for nothing less than a district championship this year,” Hager said.

The Jaguars return every lineman this season, which should provide an edge over district opponents Martin County, Knott County Central and district rival Prestonsburg. Hager says that experience will be the key to a successful season.

“I’ve told our kids, if they just come out and block and on defense, we give up too many points sometimes to win against the good teams, so we are focusing more on defense and I think defensively, we’re looking better right now than we have in the past few years,” Hager said.

Last season, Floyd Central surrendered an average of 37.5 points per game to opponents, the highest average of points given in seven seasons. The Jaguars last held opponents to under 30-points per game on average in 2018.

Floyd Central will lean heavy on the ground attack with two of last year’s top three rushers returning. Seniors Jace Martin and Colt Shelton will anchor the backfield. Both players saw significant time at quarterback as well, but Martin will be the primary signal caller in 2024. Both players combined for 964 yards rushing and 14 touchdowns.

Martin tossed 834 yards through the air to go along with 10 touchdowns last season. Shelton, Martin and departed senior BJ Petersen combined to throw 1,535 passing yards – a single season school record. Hager likes his team’s ability to stretch the defense again this fall.

“We’re going to test the waters; I think we can throw the ball a little bit.” Hager said, “If you go back to last season, there were two games where we threw the ball 28 times.”

One major goal will be replacing last season’s receiving core as only two players that caught a pass return this year. Junior Damion Cotton and sophomore Ethan Curry combined for three catches and 18 yards receiving. The Jaguars will search for wide out help from freshman playmaker Wesley Buck and senior Austin Clark, who saw significant playing time receiving on special teams last season.

Hager says he has 43-players on this year’s roster, more players than even the first season of football at Floyd Central when the school combined the rosters of Allen Central and South Floyd in 2017. Although he has more numbers, injuries are still a concern.

“We did have some depth, but we’ve got some that’s injured and it’s kind of hurt us early, but if we can get everyone back healthy then we’ve got more depth than we’ve ever had since our first year of football.”

The Jaguars will open the season on Friday, August 23rd at home against Paintsville with another home game against Leslie County the following week. Floyd Central’s first road trip will be September 6th at Powell County. Other schedule highlights include hosting county rival Betsy Layne on September 20th and “the Hager Bowl” with Father and son meeting on October 18th as the Jaguars visit Prestonsburg.

LEXINGTON, Ky. – The Kentucky men’s basketball team announced a pair of exhibition contests for its 2024-25 campaign on Friday. UK will take on Kentucky Wesleyan on Oct. 23 and Minnesota State Mankato on Oct. 29 inside of Rupp Arena at Central Bank Center.

Game times and television designations will be announced at a later date.

Earlier this week, Kentucky announced the return of Big Blue Madness to Rupp Arena which is slated for Oct. 11. Additionally, the Blue-White Preseason Experience featuring intrasquad scrimmages with both the men’s and women’s programs and more was announced for Oct. 18 inside of Historic Memorial Coliseum. Additional details will be unveiled about both events at a later time.

Kentucky is 152-12 all-time in exhibition games and has won 31 straight. UK’s game vs. Kentucky Wesleyan will mark the first competition against an opponent in the Mark Pope era.

This season’s contest against Kentucky Wesleyan will mark the third time in history the teams have met in an exhibition game. The squads met previously in preseason games in 2004 and in 2019. The teams also played 11 times in regular-season competition from 1910-1939. The Panthers earned a 21-9 overall record and a 15-5 mark in league play a season ago.

Minnesota State Mankato is the reigning 2024 Division II National Champions, claiming the title on a game-winning 3-pointer with less than a second on the clock. The Mavericks finished the year 35-2 and will take on a Division I opponent for the first time since the 2019-20 season. The 2024 meeting will be the first between the two squads. 
 

Pope and his staff have put together a dynamic roster for the 2024-25 season that features a mix of six fifth-year players, one senior, one junior, one sophomore and three freshmen.

UK’s veterans have combined to play in 845 collegiate games and have scored nearly 8,000 career points. Ansley Almonor, Lamont Butler, Andrew Carr and Amari Williams are all 1,000-point scorers. The group has also drained 1,033 career 3-pointers at a 37.0% rate.

Butler and Williams were named their league’s defensive player of the year, while Koby Brea and Jaxson Robinson have been tabbed a conference’s sixth man of the year in their career and Almonor was a most improved selection. Brandon Garrison is a former McDonald’s All-American. Kerr Kriisa has played in 99 career games and has made 238 3-pointers, while Otega Oweh has seen action in 60 games and was Oklahoma’s second-leading scorer a season ago.

Kentucky’s freshman group includes Travis Perry and Trent Noah from the state of Kentucky and Collin Chandler, a former top-35 signee in the class of 2022. Perry is the state’s all-time leading scorer, while Noah broke the Sweet 16 state record for most 3-pointers drained in a single run with 19 this season.

Season ticket renewals for the 2024-25 Kentucky men’s basketball season are now available to all season ticket holders. The renewal deadline is Thursday, Aug. 29.

Those interested in season tickets are encouraged to enter the season-ticket lottery. Due to the extremely high renewal rate of men’s basketball season tickets, only a limited number of upper-level tickets are available each year through the lottery.

A limited number of new lower-level season tickets are available with a capital pledge commitment, as are memberships in Rupp Arena’s newest hospitality space, the Champions Club. For more information on premium options, please contact the K Fund Office at (859) 257-6300. 

PRESTONSBURG, Ky. (WMDJ) – Former Blackcat football standout Wes Hager has returned to his alma mater confident that he can bring Prestonsburg High School football back to prominence.

The son of Floyd Central head football coach Shawn Hager, Wes was serving as an assistant coach at Martin County High School, helping the Cardinals offense create video game statistics for a team that finished (7-6), falling to Beechwood in the regional championship last season.

The first-year head coach will look to turn the page on a forgettable 2023 season that saw the Prestonsburg program fall well below expectations, losing to county rivals Betsy Layne and Floyd Central. To make matters worse, Betsy Layne was even able to notch their first-ever playoff win over Prestonsburg, defeating the Blackcats twice last fall after going 36 seasons between victories over the blueblood program.

Hager has enjoyed a nice honeymoon period since his hiring was announced in February, but he’s ready for the pressure that comes with meeting expectations in Prestonsburg.

“I understand I’m young, but I’m very energetic, very ready to get started like I said,” Hager said.  “I’ve embraced the pressure because this program like I said, it was one of the best programs in eastern Kentucky. Rome wasn’t built in a day, there’s going to be a process, but I would encourage the fans and the community to get behind us and you’ll start to see things turn around.”

Hager brings instant credibility and a renewed vigor to Prestonsburg. Wes brings not only the experience of being a coach’s son to his new position of leadership, but he will also draw from experiences of playing under longtime Blackcats coach John Derossett and being around the legendary Jim Matney while his father was coaching at Sheldon Clark.

“I’ve taken aspects from both John Derossett, Jim Matney and my dad and kinda blended them together. I come from a long line of unbelievable coaches, but I’m going to try to make my own thing. I’m not going to re-invent the wheel, I’m going to create a name for myself.”

Prestonsburg will run the veer-and-shoot offense, which Hager says will give the Blackcats multiple looks for opponents to try and stop. Versatility will be the key for Prestonsburg’s offense and create an exciting brand of football for the players.

“2A football you just don’t know what athletes you’re going to get. One year you may have three backs that are bruisers and one year you might have three Olympic track guys.”

Prestonsburg will lean heavy on senior Dalton Elliott, who collected over 900 yards of total offense and scored 12 touchdowns in 2023. Elliott will not only handle snaps out of the backfield but expect to see Elliott run the offense from the quarterback position in a wildcat scheme.

The Blackcats will open the season on the road at Leslie County on August 23^rd. Prestonsburg will then take part in the WYMT Community Trust Bank Pike County Bowl, facing East Ridge on August 31^st. The Blackcats first home game will be against Paintsville on September 6^th. Prestonsburg will look avenge losses to their county rivals, hosting Betsy Layne on September 27^th and Floyd Central in district play on October 18^th.