The North Daviess Cougars roared out of the gate in the first half of their season opener against Washington Catholic and that was enough to hold off WC, 79-49 on Saturday.

In spite of missing one of the Cougars’ top guns in Thomas Nugent (due to illness), ND was able to get a career-high of 24 points from Jacob Miller, helping to an insurmountable 31-point first half lead.

“It was a nice start for us,” said ND coach Brent Dalrymple. “I was a little worried about our defense and rebounding, but we took care of those things in the first half.

“We had kids on the floor that we hadn’t looked at much since this summer, but we did a nice job of adjusting to the illnesses and injuries. This was game one, but we will go back to the drawing board and look at making some changes and adjustments where we have to.”

The Cougars’ balanced scoring was also evident as they got 17 from Kendall Wittmer and 13 each from Lucas Swartzentruber and Logan Wagler.

“I think on any given night, any of our top seven can lead us in scoring,” added Dalrymple.

The Cougars raced out to an early 12-4 lead and would eventually go into the first stop with a 18-6 lead after getting scoring from six different sources.

“I have told the kids that you have to be ready to play from the start,” said WC coach Bill Brown. “All of a sudden you are down by 30 points before we decide to play.

“We know we are going to struggle early. We haven’t found an identity as an offense yet. We lost a lot of scoring from last year. We have some good shooters but they haven’t played a lot of varsity basketball.”

The second quarter also belonged to ND and more specifically, Miller. The lanky left-hander scored 14 points in the quarter as the Cougars raced out to the 41-10 lead, helped somewhat by five Cardinal turnovers in the first three minutes of the quarter.

However, the Cardinals came out running in the second half.

“That is something we have worked on. We have to get the ball out and go. We have to find a way to score easy baskets. Austin Jarrett got most of his points off the fast break and that is what we need to do. In the first half we were totally out of sync,” said Brown.

WC got treys from Jon Costello, Matt Stuart and Luke Mitchell, along with three interior buckets from 6-5 Harrison Holmes and a pair of slashing baskets from Austin Jarrett. However, in spite of putting up 23 points during the quarter, ND was able to trade basket-for-basket and maintained the 31-point margin in the third, 64-33.

“I give WC a lot of credit. They changed their game and really came out flying up and down the floor,” said Dalrymple.

WC continued the up- tempo pace in the final eight minutes. Austin Deem drained a pair of treys, helping WC back to as close as 22 and actually outscored ND, 16-15, but the Cougars would go 8 of 9 from the free throw line to help seal the 30-point win.

“I was pleased with Austin Deem, especially on defense,” said Brown. “He drew three charges and played the defense we have to play from all five guys. Matt Stuart also really played well. I thought as a team we played well in the second half.”

For the night Jarrett and Holmes had 11 each, while Costello added nine and Stuart had seven. Deem ended with six and Mitchell had five. Jarrett was the Cardinals’ leading rebounder with eight, while Miller and Wittmer had six each for ND. Lucas Swartzentruber posted six steals, while Wagler had five assists. Costello dished out eight assists for WC.

The Cougar JV also picked up the win, 54-17. Mitchell led WC with six, while Deem and Babrick had four each. Adam Joyce added a pair and Brayton Ashby had one. ND was led by 12 from Anthony Steffey and got 11 from Joey Riggins.