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| Segment Number Seven |
| Still stinging from our early ouster from the 1999 District Tournament, the 1999-00 team vowed to make amends. The Season Opened With High Hopes as the Mustangs Set Yet Another School Record by Reeling Off Six Consecutive Wins to Begin the Season. A come-from-behind overtime win over Conner, and wins over Paris, Holy Cross, Bracken County, Campbell County in the Crosstown Shootout and then defeating Number One Ranked Covington Catholic in Overtime put the Mustangs well on their way down the road to success. |
| Brossart Sets Down No. 1 CovCath (Again) Mustangs win sixth straight By Kellie Taylor, Post contributor Bishop Brossart senior center David Enzweiler had made a proclamation to his team. In some future tight game, he had said he would find the ball in his hands, when his Mustangs teammates needed his 6-foot-4 frame and soft touch the most. Tuesday night, Enzweiler proved to be a soothsayer. Enzweiler scored six points in overtime, including a three-point play with 40 seconds left, to give the Mustangs a 63-61 lead over visiting Covington Catholic. Free throws by Enzweiler, junior guard Chris Ryan and junior point guard Jon Lloyd sealed the 66-63 win, as Brossart upset the top team in The Post's coaches poll. ''It's never happened to me, but I always kid the guys and say, 'One of these days, I'm going to get the ball at the end of the game and it's going to all be up to me,' '' said Enzweiler, one of four seniors on Brossart's roster. ''Luckily, I got the ball and came through, and some other players stepped up and hit some key free throws. ''Last year, we got drubbed at their place. We wanted to get them back and earn some respect. These are the games we looked forward to playing, the big games. I was real happy to win this one.'' On the go-ahead play, Enzweiler drove to the basket from the left elbow, made the shot and was fouled by CovCath's Chad Wachs. Brossart, which was unranked in the preseason poll, improves to 6-0, the team's best start in well over a decade. CovCath falls to 3-2. ''The boys executed real well and played their hearts out,'' Brossart head coach Willie Schlarman said. ''I think that's why we were able to get the job done. ''It's an amazing start to the year. I don't think any of us, when we looked at the schedule, envisioned that this would happen. We're playing hard, got some good breaks in a couple games, and we'd like to keep this going.'' An aggressive Brossart defense held off a second-half CovCath rally. The Colonels trailed by 10 points in the second quarter but rallied back behind senior forward Brett Dietz's seven third-quarter points. Dietz finished with a team-high 19 points. But fullcourt pressure by the Mustangs in the fourth quarter and overtime caused several CovCath turnovers, many the team was able to capitalize on. Senior forward Jeff Clark made two steals in the last minute of regulation, resulting in a layup and a pass to Lloyd, who was fouled and hit both free throws. But it was Clark's crucial free throw that forced overtime. Trailing, 55-54, Clark drove the baseline and was fouled on the layup by Wachs with one second left. The senior hit the second of two free throws to send the game into overtime. Clark also set up Enzweiler's last-minute shot, picking off an inbound pass and dishing off to the fellow senior. ''I was looking for one of their players to be coming around on the curl,'' Clark said. ''I saw the ball pop loose and just reached out and grabbed it. ''Ever since my freshman year, we have wanted to do this well. We're on top of the world. Now, we just have to take one game at a time and play our hardest every time out.'' CovCath made more shots from the field (25-23) and hit the same number of three-point shots (four) as Brossart but was plagued by turnovers and poor free-throw shooting. ''It was a well-fought game,'' CovCath head coach Dan Tieman said. ''We did what we wanted to do offensively, and we did what we wanted to do defensively, but we turned the ball over too much and they capitalized on the turnovers. It got to a crucial point in the ball game, and our kids turned the ball over. You are not going to win games like that, especially against good ball clubs like Brossart.'' Ryan finished with a game-high 21 points, and Clark added 15 points. COVCATH 13 18 12 12 8 -63 BROSSART 17 16 8 14 11 -66 COVCATH (63): McQuade 3 2 10, Blazejewski 2 0 4, Baute 1 0 2, Dietz 9 0 19, Purdon 7 3 18, Wachs 2 4 8, Middendorf 1 0 2. Totals 25 9 63. BISHOP BROSSART (66): Lloyd 2 1 5, Ryan 6 6 21, Clark 5 5 15, Lushek 2 0 4, Enzweiler 4 3 11, Seiter 4 1 10. Totals 23 16 66. Three-point goals: CC-McQuade 2, Dietz, Purdon. BB-Ryan 3, Seiter. Records: CovCath 3-2, Brossart 6-0. |
| The Article Below Appeared in The Kentucky Post on Wednesday, December 15, 1999 after The Brossart Mustangs defeated then Number One Ranked Covington Catholic 66-63 in overtime. This marked the second time in two trips to Alexandria during the Schlarman era that the Colonels were tagged with a loss |
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| Mustangs Fall To Nicholas County in 10th Region All "A" Tournament After reeling off six consecutive wins to start the season, including the win over Number One CovCath described above, the Mustangs took the off-ramp on the road to success. They would finish out the regular season with a 7-12 record after that brilliant 6-0 start. We would lose to NCC on the hill, Campbell County in the MCIT in Overtime, and even to Boone County in our homecoming game. The most devestating loss however, and perhaps the most impactful loss that we would take that year would be to Nicholas County in the All "A" Regional Tournament in Paris on January 20, 2000. I guess it is not surprising that I cannot locate any newspaper articles about that game, we probably wrapped the trash in them, it was that bad. All year we had pointed towards the All "A" and were favored, along with St. Patrick, to represent the 10th Region in Richmond that year. Nicholas County had a nice team that year and were certainly a threat, but the Mustangs had a seven point lead heading into the fourth quarter of the game and appeared about to advance. Poor shooting from the field and the free-throw line allowed Nicholas County to sneak back into the game and pull out a 49-44 win over our Mustangs, effectively knocking us back to square one. (St. Patrick went on to cruise to the All "A" Tournament Title) Immediately following the game in his post-game talk with the team, Coach Schlarman pointed out that we had missed out on a major opportunity, failed to achieve one of our team's major goals, and would have to re-group in order to contend the remainder of the season. He pointed out to them that while we had effectively blown the All "A" opportunity, that the big prize was still out there for the taking in the form of the upcoming 38th District and 10th Region Tournaments. That night as the team listened to Coach Schlarman's dissertation, few in that locker room probably felt confident that after losing to Nicholas County in the All "A" that the propect of winning the district and/or the regional tournament was a very realistic goal. Feelings that this team was "toast" and that they had begun to anticipate the upcoming baseball season began to circulate, permiating the atmosphere that this was to become a season-lost, after getting off to such a promising start. In the weeks leading up to the All "A" there was some banter among the coaching staff about installing a more free-lance form of an open-post offense into the Mustangs offensive scheme. Coach Schlarman had determined that we would stick with the season-long game plan and not make any radical changes until after the All "A" Tournament. It was determined that night that the open-post offense would now be installed and that things would get tougher at practice in the weeks ahead leading up to the district and regional tournaments. In the eleven days void created between the Nicholas County loss and our next regular season game with Dixie Heights the Mustangs faced boot-camp-like conditions. Twice a day practices including early morning sessions became the norm. Coach Scharman himself admitted that he was about as popular as "onion breath" during this time, but drastic measures were needed to right the ship and those drastic measures were taken. The JVs assumed the status of becoming the varsity while the majority of the varsity went from wearing the green varsity practice jerseys to becoming white shirted and forced to win their starting spots back. The open-post offense was put in place. The next Mustangs opponent was to be Walton-Verona with the mentality being that our JVs would be able to compete with the Bearcats and the former varsity players, when given a chance would rise to the occasion and secure their old jobs back. However, a a snow cancellation placed the Walton game further down the schedule and the Mustangs would emerge from their eleven days of "preparation" to face the Dixie Heights Colonels. Coach Schlarman sent the JVs after the AAAA Colonels. True to his word the JVs-Turned-Varsity started the Dixie game and the Mustangs responded to seeing someone other than their teammates across the ball, by beating the Colonels 52-44. The Colonels didn't have a chance. There was no way that the Brossart Mustangs were going to take another loss and remain estranged from their head coach. They battled their way back into his good graces. The 1999-00 Mustangs would continue to struggle sporadically however, losing five of their last six regular season games and head into the 38th District Tournament with a season record of 13-12. Many thought the end was near as the Mustangs had drawn a very veteran Pendleton County Wildcat team as their first round opponent and many thought that the Wildcats would end the Mustangs misery and send them on to baseball practice early. However, rumors of the Mustangs demise were to be greatly exaggerated. The Mustangs survived Pendleton County 59-56, beat Bracken County 72-49, and won the 38th District crown by beating Campbell County in the finals 60-54. The open-post offense had caught on, we had added a new demension to our game, and the Mustangs of old were back on a roll. The confidence that was lost through the mid-season had returned. The Seniors began to re-emerge as leaders and the Mustangs looked forward to a return to The Fieldhouse and competition in the following week's 10th Region Tournament. |
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