24th District Tournament Preview (6th Region)

24th at Mercy

* Wednesday – Whitefield Academy (4) vs. Bullitt East (1), 6:00

Tyler Sharpe and the Bullitt East team has already defeated Whitefield once this season in early January by 33 points. There is not any way that Whitefield can close that gap, and BE has been playing much better of late. BE wins by 20 or more in this one.

* Wednesday - Jeffersontown (3) vs. Fern Creek (2), 7:30

This is going to be a tough battle that likely goes down to the end. Senior Brandon Johnson for JTown will not go down in his last game of a great career without a fight. If he goes off for one of his 35-40 point games then JTown could likely advance. If Fern Creek can key on him like they did in the 1st half of their previous victory over JTown then they could possibly hold Johnson closer to 20 points. If that happens, then Fern Creek likely advances. If he scores between 22-33 points then it will come down to who else comes to play for JTown. No other team needs to rely on one player in this region like JTown does with Johnson. If I am the Coach, I let him have free will to do whatever he thinks it will take to get the team a victory and advance to the Regional Tournament. Since I feel the Coach will not give that free hall pass, I am predicting a Fern Creek win by 5 or less.

* Friday – Final, 7

This will likely be Fern Creek facing Bullitt East, but it could also be JTown (see above). For this final district pairing I feel Bullitt East will win by a close game over either team. I have mentioned before that with the younger players at Fern Creek it will be whether they are bothered by the big game environment of their first district final. If they respond without being impacted and Tony Washington is hitting his shots, the Tigers could get an upset. There is less margin of error for Fern Creek to win than Bullitt East so I am expecting a close battle that leaves BE as the #1 seed advancing from this district.