Defense Leaves Liberal

Liberal had been competitive in every game but one this season. They weren’t competitive in a home game against Sunrise Christian. That was somewhat expected. They played that game without Jade Cathey and against a private school with towering talent. But Thursday night, the Redskins were blown out of their own building in a head scratching 63-41 loss to a 10-11 Kapaun team. Kapaun led 14-6 after one quarter and 23-16 at halftime before a 46-31 lead after three quarters ballooning to 55-33 in the fourth quarter. LHS head coach Drew Gruver who is now 4-4 in the post season says there’s an explanation. "We didn’t play a lick of defense the whole night," Gruver said. "That’s been one of our strong points that we’ve always been pretty good at is playing defense. We just didn’t bring it and obviously that showed tonight."

Jade Cathey scored 18 in his final game while fellow senior Slader McVey had 10. Liberal finishes 9-12 losing their last five games and six of their last seven games. It’s Liberal’s first losing season since going 6-15 in 2006.