HADLEY – A fierce and ferocious battle between Hampshire South rivals Pioneer and Hopkins on Tuesday night culminated in a 55-53 win for Pioneer. Joshua Wood led the scoring for Pioneer with 15 points while Hopkins’ Teddy Cyr posted 21 points for the home squad.  

“It was a good game. We had our chances, we had four or five chances in the last two minutes,” Hopkins head coach Jim Hart said. “It's just one of those games. Usually we win those games...They’re a big team, and we struggle with big teams.” 

The first quarter was all Pioneer, highlighted by three triples from Brayden Thayer and Wood and a nine-point performance from Kurt Redeker, many of those second-chance layups. The Panthers were all over Hopkins when it came to the boards in the first half, getting second chance opportunities that they capitalized on. The visitors had a commanding 23-11 lead after the first eight minutes. 

Pioneer head coach Scott Thayer said that his team is younger this year, but the Panthers played like seasoned veterans in the opening frame against Hopkins. 

“Most of them are sophomores and juniors, they're physically growing, but the mental maturity, the muscle between their ears is constantly improving for us and that makes all the other attributes improve,” Thayer said. “I would have been happy either way tonight...and I still would have been pleased with our mental effort. We never looked disjointed or kind of like we're gonna give up.” 

Pioneer knew that a team like Hopkins wasn’t going to go away, and the Golden Hawks took over in the second frame. Though Thayer and Wood hit another three each, Hopkins closed out the quarter with a 12-0 run over the last four and a half minutes, highlighted by a buzzer-beater triple from Chace Earle to send the Golden Hawks into halftime with a 32-31 lead. 

“We made good decisions on the passing. We made some extra passes, we got the ball up on the break, we pushed the ball up on the break,” Hart said on their second quarter play. “It was a good run and we were excited.” 

Pioneer unleashed some more threes in the third quarter to rebuild its lead, but the honey badgers of Hopkins chipped away all period, pulling within five with a steal and layup at the third quarter horn by Patrick Fitzgibbons. 

Hopkins opened the fourth quarter with a layup from Cyr and a triple from Cody West to tie the game back up, and from there it was game on. Pioneer hit a few more timely triples to retake the lead, but Hopkins pulled within two with five seconds left on the clock. Ultimately, the Panthers defense shut down the Golden Hawks last-ditch effort to tie the game up and secured the win. 

“We seemed to shoot the ball a little bit better than have been, and we always talk about defend and rebound,” Pioneer head coach Scott Thayer said. “They run such good offense, sometimes that's hard for us to defend and then especially in the fourth quarter, we were limiting to one shot, they only had one opportunity, they weren't getting second and third opportunities, so that was critical.”

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