[RealJokersWild24]

Bobbie Keith has left the building. Clay is not that kind of program anymore.

Clay County is still one of the larger schools in the 13th, has great facilities, has tradition, is still a "basketball school", and gets a lot of support from the community. There's a lot of middle ground between replicating the great success Keith had and barely squeaking by Redbird and Oneida Baptist Institute, being dominated in a district game by a North Laurel team that has been rated as the 3rd to 6th best squad in the region most of the year, etc.

It's not like Clay County has: played some brutal schedule that's left them with this record (the schedule is usually stronger) or had injuries that you just can't plan for (i.e., a kid you were counting on to play a major role tearing his ACL in the second game of the year).

Certainly, it is not the Clay County of the 80's and early 90's. I think most around the program know and realize that, however, that does not mean that it is still unreal that they expect things like:

- Having a winning season

- Dominating record in district play

- Go into the regional tournament with at least a puncher's chance of winning in down years and a favorite in "up years"

- Be well coached and play disciplined, fundamentally sound basketball

- Have the program heading in a good direction for "up years"



Last year, the sunshine pumpers were saying that it would be a "rebuilding year". Now this year is also being billed as a "rebuilding year". Nothing about the play this year has inspired confidence for next year or that Glenn is guy to right the ship and correct course. Don't think he's a bad person or anything, just probably not the right coach for the pressure cooker that is Clay County basketball. The year has been defined by horrible defensive game plans, offense that is capable but has been allowed to lapse and has reinforced bad habits, and what the trained eye may infer as "chemistry" issues, etc.

If some of the things I am hearing are true (players leaving after the season), then it will truly show how far this team has fallen-- heck, that it's even a possibility that kids want to leave Clay County (when, let's be real, it has typically been the reverse) evidences that.


Lots of economic, social, and cultural factors may prevent Clay County from being what they were in the late 80's and early 90's for a span of such dominance-- I will give you that. It is hard to see a school anywhere these days stringing off a run of seven consecutive regional titles as Clay County did at one point. It would be hard for a mountain school to have a run like Clay County did from around 1983 to 1992 [maybe the best ten year clip for a mountain program in the history of Kentucky High School Basketball considering that it produced a State Title ('87), two Runner-Ups ('84 and '88), and a Final Four ('92) and they could have conceivably won it in each of those, not to mention being eliminated by the eventual champion in '86, going in undefeated and ranked #1 in '90 before being upset, etc.]. The point of the history mentioned above being that, seeing a run from a mountain team the way that Clay County did it at the time is unlikely for any school in the mountains. Clay County did it once, and I don't know if there's a mountain school has even been close to doing it like that a first time, much less being able to sustain that today. So yes, Clay County today is going to be less dominant than the Clay County of old, but so would practically any other team in regions 13 through 16 that you could pick to compare them to.