“Salute to the Lady Cardinals and Lady Bulldogs” coming up Saturday

The PAR Broadcast Group is teaming with U-Click TV to salute the March state tournament runs of the girls basketball programs at Trenton High School and Mercer High School.

A program saluting the Class 1 state champion Lady Cardinals and Class 3 fourth-place winning Lady Bulldogs will air at 2 o’clock this Saturday at Royal Inn Pizza in Trenton.

The public is invited to gather at Royal Inn Pizza at 1 o’clock.  Members of the Mercer and Trenton basketball teams can eat for free, courtesy of Royal Inn Pizza.  However, other members of the general public attending the festivities will be charged regular price for their orders.

KTTN/KGOZ Sports Director Tom Johnson will be joined by Chillicothe Mayor and long-time area sports contributor Chuck Haney in hosting the show, expected to run from 2 o’clock to just past the 3 o’clock hour.  Interviews will be conducted with school administrators, Coaches Dan Owens and Brian Upton, and selected players from the Mercer and Trenton teams.

Mercer won its first-ever state championship with a victory over Walnut Grove on March 11th at Mizzou Arena in Columbia.  Three players on the Lady Cardinals will be playing at the collegiate level this fall, with Bailey Owens (daughter of Coach Dan Owens) playing at D-2 Northwest Missouri State, while Lindsay Wyatt and Nicole Kost head to North Central Missouri College to join the Lady Pirates.  Trenton finished 4th place in Class 3, completing the first-ever season in Lady Bulldog history with losses to Whitfield and Lutheran North in competitive games in Columbia on March 9th and 10th.  Before the trip to Columbia, Trenton won district games against Bishop LeBlond, Hamilton, and Lathrop, followed by playoff wins over Lawson and Kansas City Southeast.

In comparison to Mercer, Trenton’s squad is much younger, returning all of its roster in 2017-2018 except for All-District senior forward Whitley Richman, who will join Wyatt and Kost as part of the NCMC recruiting class this fall.  Ashten Whitaker returns for her senior season, while a group of six sophomores, including Class 3 all-state selection Ainsley Tolson, will be back for their junior seasons.  That group is expected to include Salem Croy, who missed the final seven weeks of the season after suffering a torn ligament in her ankle during January’s Hamilton Tournament.  Croy, a starting small forward for the Lady Bulldogs, recently underwent surgery on the ankle, expected to keep her out of action until the summer.

The “Mercer and Trenton” salute show at Royal Inn Pizza can be heard on Saturday afternoon on KTTN FM 92.3, with the show available online at U-Click TV (www.uclicktv.com).