Sports

NOBLE – The biggest offensive effort of Malachi Nicholson’s career set up El Reno High School's football team for its first district win of the season.

Yet it was his biggest defensive play that sealed the deal as the Indians defeated Noble 68-67 after rallying from 18 points down late in the third period.

Noble made it a one-point game with 55.2 seconds left, scoring on a 14-yard touchdown pass from Joey Bear to Logan Kirby. Following a timeout, the Bears opted to go for a 2-point conversion.

El Reno High School’s fast-pitch softball team played its final road games of the regular season last week, dropping two games at Enid and a neutral site game to Edmond North.

The Indians fell to 15-15 overall with 12-4 and 4-1 setbacks to Enid, followed by a 4-2 loss to the Huskies.

El Reno went 14-of-57 (.246) from the plate over the three games, getting a double each from Iliana Ashford and Micah Woods. Maddie Moss (.556) and Ashford (.556) led with five hits each.

Justine Johnson, Maddie Brinkman, Woods and Ryah Hardy closed with a hit each.

Pictured are members of El Reno’s seventh-grade volleyball team, winners of the 2023 Suburban Conference Championships.

Ryah Hardy hit a walk-off double as El Reno High School’s softball team said goodbye to its four seniors with a 10-9 come-from-behind win over the Oklahoma City Broncos.

The game was the lone home outing for El Reno (15-12) in September as the Indians will wrap up the month with road games against Enid and Edmond North.

Head coach Jason Little said El Reno is trying to work out the officiating details to pick up a home tuneup game to end the regular season against Duncan on Monday, Oct. 2.

The Indians split road matches last week, snapping a nine-match losing streak by beating Del City 3-1.

EHS then fell to Cache by a 3-0 margin.

Calumet High School’s baseball team, ranked second in the state, walked into the regional round of the Class B playoffs with a 6-5 come-from-behind win over Amber-Pocasset.

The Chieftains, winners of 12 straight games, trailed Ampo 5-2 going into the bottom of the seventh before getting an RBI-single from Hunter Arnold.

Calumet would load the bases before drawing three straight walks from Brendon Voss, Kingston Arnold and Carson Cooper – the latter being the game-winning pass.

Redlands Community College women’s soccer team allowed a trio of goals within a 10-minute period of the second half as Northeastern Oklahoma A&M College rallied for a 3-1 win over the Cougars.

The loss was the fourth in a row for Redlands, which slipped to 1-8 overall.

The Cougars dropped to 1-7 in the NJCAA Region 2 standings, which is eighth.

Redlands took a 1-0 lead into the half after getting a goal from Avery Turner off an assist from Payton Brickey. However, the Cougars did not score over the final 60 minutes of the match.

Elgin did not dominate El Reno High School’s football team like a 54-21 final score might indicate.

In fact, only 40 yards separated the two schools in total offensive output.

So what was the biggest factor in the Owls 33-point win over El Reno in the District 5A-1 opener for both schools?

Bad luck on the part of the Indians.

More specifically, bad luck on four separate instances which played a direct factor in points being put on the scoreboard for both teams.