South Pemiscot boys take fourth at state, close year with promising performance

South Pemiscot's Robert Farmer attempts a layup during the March 7, 2024 MSHSAA Class 2 third-place game between the South Pemiscot Bulldogs and the Salisbury Panthers at Mizzou Arena in Columbia, Mo.

Cole Lee ~ clee@semoball.com

South Pemiscot’s magical run to a program-first final four came to a bitter end on Thursday afternoon, dropping the Class 2 third-place game to Salisbury 77-66.

Holding a double-digit lead for much of the early goings of the contest, South Pemiscot showed it had the firepower to take the win but couldn’t ice it out down the stretch.

Led by the scoring impressive efforts of Robert Farmer in cahoots with Jaterion Smith down low and Ty Campbell in the guard tandem, the Bulldogs got a big offensive night after sounding a harsh note on Wednesday.

Even so, the Bulldogs couldn’t keep Salisbury out of the win column en route to claiming the fourth-place medal at Mizzou Arena in Columbia, Missouri.

“I thought our kids came out ready to go,” Bulldogs coach Jordan McGowan said.

“We had the lead at half and played well but Salisbury, with good senior leadership, came up and played extremely hard.

“Turned us over some and kind of took control of the game, and that was the end of it.”

This season, there’ve been a lot of growing pains and growing gains for the Bulldogs.

They started the season off totally unsure where they’d place within the ranks of bootheel schools, including a dismal exit in the consolation semifinals at the Bloomfield Christmas Tournament.

But, as the season progressed, they grew up and learned much about who they were as a program and, in turn, blossomed into one of the top teams in the bootheel.

With the power of its young core, and some veteran leadership from Jimmie Morton and Torrell Boyd, those youthful Bulldogs turned into a force to be reckoned with.

That, and a final-four team for the first time in school history.

“Growing up happened right in front of our eyes about mid-January,” McGowan said.

“With that being said, we struggled early. We had a couple of disappointing losses at Christmas. But we did beat a great Risco team early, and that's kind of when our feet started going.

“By January, it started clicking.”

That clicking led South Pemiscot to become one of the top teams in the entire region, as the Bulldogs started cruising by teams that it’d have struggled against earlier in the year.

They strung together seven consecutive wins entering the final four, including huge victories against Richland, Cabool and Puxico to get the machine running at full strength.

Only losing Morton, who made some strides in the final four stage, the Bulldogs retain almost their entire team going into the 2024-25 season with lofty goals already.

Knowing how they ended the season, the Bulldogs of South Pemiscot are ready to put their stamp among the ranks of local powerhouses and lay claim to yet another berth in the state final four.

Next year, says shifty sophomore guard Robert Farmer, the stakes are a little bit higher than they are now.

“We'll be back next year,” Farmer said.

“Definitely better than fourth place.”

South Pemiscot got it running against Salisbury early, forcing the Panthers into some bad shots and getting into a rhythm quickly.

Robert Farmer, who went cold late on Wednesday, began his third-place game with a ridiculous handful of contested buckets.

He finished his first quarter with 14 points, single-handedly outscoring Salisbury as the Bulldogs went up 21-11 on the Panthers early.

The South Pemiscot crowd was loving their intensity, and you could tell the Bulldogs were loving it too.

After a rough start from the Panther offense, they kicked it into high gear for the second quarter and began to catch South Pemiscot out of sorts defensively.

Cooper Francis, who hit triple after triple in Wednesday’s loss against Weaubleau, went off in that second quarter.

His 13 points in the first half made that 10-point lead after one shrink to a 39-32 lead at the end of the first half.

Although the Bulldog offense was still cooking, the Panthers had some momentum.

Soon after, those Panthers stole the lead after rallying back into the game with another huge quarter from Francis.

His 14 points in the third quarter alone helped Salisbury to tie the game at 52-all going into the final frame, getting South Pemiscot on its heels after holding a big lead early.

In the first minute of the fourth quarter, the Panthers finally broke through when Hayden Wooldridge grabbed a lobbed pass over a defender’s hands and got the and-1 off a foul from that same Bulldog defender.

The Salisbury crowd erupted, and rightfully so as the Panthers soon doubled down on that edge with a Grayson Cole triple to take a 58-52 lead.

Looking to make a big run back, South Pemiscot surely ramped up the intensity; but the blood ran cold defensively, letting the Panthers run further and further out of reach.

Salisbury scored on almost every possession in the middle stretches of the fourth, and each time the Panther crowd roared louder as that early edge the Bulldogs held defensively wore dull.

In need of a big spark, freshman guard Ty Campbell buried back-to-back triples in the final minutes, immediately sending the Bulldog faithful into a frenzy and putting some wind back in the sails.

Despite this, Salisbury’s lead was far too large to recover from as the Panthers hung on for a 77-66 victory to seal up a third-place run and snag a bronze medal at state.

Robert Farmer finished the game with 22 points in the loss, with Ty Campbell following close behind with a 16-point day and Jaterion Smith’s 13 in the post rounding out double-digit scorers.

All three of those players are sophomores or freshman, further emphasizing the youth and growth of this South Pemiscot squad.

The tale of the day was Cooper Francis, who scored a whopping 37 points in the victory for Salisbury on 11-of-19 shooting while converting 13 free throws.

Paired with another 21 points from Hayden Wooldridge, the two combining for 58 points, the Panthers poured the points on South Pemiscot late as veteran leadership led them home.

SALISBURY 77, SOUTH PEMISCOT 66

Salisbury (77) — Cooper Francis 37, Hayden Wooldridge 21, Grayson Cole 10, Jake Peiffer 4, Mason Stapleton 3, Eli Jackson 2. FG: 27. (3-pointers: Francis 2, Cole 1)

South Pemiscot (66) — Robert Francis 22, Ty Campbell 16, Jaterion Smith 13, Torrell Boyd 8, Jimmie Morton 5, Damarius Mayberry 2. FG: 24. (3-pointers: Campbell 2, Boyd 1, Farmer 1, Morton 1)