High School Basketball in Jessamine County

Soon, the sounds of dribbling basketballs and the roar of the crowds will return to the gymnasiums at Jessamine County’s two high schools, East and West, as the 2022-23 basketball season gets underway. The goal of every high school hoop team is to make it to the state tournament at the end of the season. In the past one hundred three years, there have been eleven Jessamine County school basketball teams, five girls teams and six boys teams, that have competed in interscholastic competition in the Kentucky High School Athletic Association, combining for five trips to the state tourney.

Nicholasville High School (Tarantulas)

History reveals to us that the first interscholastic basketball team in Jessamine County was the Nicholasville High School girls team which finished as the state tournament runner up in 1920. At that time, the post season state tournament was by invitation, and the girls tournament in 1920 was held at the YMCA in Paris on March 12th and 13th. Nicholasville beat Winchester 25 to 5 in the first round, then beat Lexington High (now named “Henry Clay”) by a score of 23 to 20 in three overtime periods, and then lost the championship game to Paris 32-10.

Likely, the extra three periods took its toll on the Nicholasville girls.

Nicholasville girls played twelve seasons altogether, before girls basketball was dropped as a sanctioned sport by the KHSAA after the 1932 season, and by the time it returned in 1974, Nicholasville had been consolidated with Wilmore to form Jessamine County High School. Nicholasville had a combined record of sixty-two wins and ninety-eight losses (38.7%).

The Nicholasville boys played thirty-eight seasons, but found post-season success difficult in a very tough district and region, often having to face the Lexington schools in both the district and region. Three of the four Nicholasville boys district runner up seasons, came during the 1943-1945 war years when the districts were split into two to reduce travel, and the only teams left in the resulting split district were Wilmore and Nicholasville. Nicholasville boys never won a district or region title and had a combined record of 270 wins and 586 losses (31.5%).

Wilmore High School (Bears)

Wilmore girls played only three seasons before the KHSAA stopped sanctioning girls basketball. They won twentyfour games and lost seventeen (58.5%), but never won a district or region title. They did win the 1930 B-Division district title in the era when the district, region, and state tournament were split into A and B divisions by enrollment. However, they lost the game for the overall district championship to Paris.

Wilmore boys won four district championships, including three during the two-team-district war years mentioned above, and were the runner up six times. Of their ten trips to the regional tournament, they were never able to win it. However, Wilmore had many good teams and posted a thirty-four year overall winning record of 441394 (52.8%).

Jessamine County (Colts)

Nicholasville and Wilmore were combined to form Jessamine County High School in the fall of 1958. There were only boys teams at that time, and the girls at Jessamine County would not get an opportunity to play competitively until 1974.

After consolidation, it took the Jessamine County boys six seasons to advance to the region, being the district runner up in 1964. They finally won the district in 1965, and would match that feat ten more times with the last one coming in 1990. That year, they also won the 11th Region Tournament, shocking region favorite Henry Clay in the semifinals on a late basket, and then beating Lexington Catholic convincingly in the championship. At the state tournament, the Colts beat Paducah Tilghman in the opening game, then lost to Covington Holmes in the quarterfinals. It would prove to be Jessamine County High School’s lone trip to the Sweet Sixteen. The boys had a thirtynine year combined record of 513-506 (50.3%).

Jessamine County girls basketball began in 1974-75, and won four district championships. They never won a region title or played in the state tournament. Over their twenty-three seasons, the girls were 196-321 (37.9%).

Rosenwald-Dunbar (Titans)

The Titans boys team started in 1945-46 and played eighteen seasons until being integrated with Jessamine County high school for the 1963-64 school year.

Until the 1957-58 season, the Titans played in the Kentucky High School Athletic League (KHSAL), which was a league for segregated African-American schools similar to the KHSAA for white schools. Beginning in 1958, Rosenwald-Dunbar was a member of the KHSAA and participated in the same district and region as Jessamine County High.

The best season for the Titans was in 1956-57, when they won the Bluegrass Conference and advanced to the KHSAL state tournament at Kentucky State University in Frankfort. They suffered a first round loss but completed a very successful season.

East Jessamine (Jaguars) and West Jessamine (Colts)

Jessamine County High School was split in 1997 to create East Jessamine and West Jessamine. East became the Jaguars while West retained the Colts nickname. The schools’ timelines run a parallel course over the past twenty-five seasons, playing the first eight seasons in the 42nd District of the 11th Region with three other Lexington schools, then moving to the 46th District in the 12th Region with the Mercer County schools.

The 12th Region has been good for Jessamine County teams. West Jessamine boys have won eleven district titles and three region championships. In its twenty-five year history, West Jessamine boys have only failed to qualify for the Region four times. They played in two state tournaments at Rupp Arena in 2009 and 2010, advancing to the final four in 2009. They won the 12th Region in 2020, but Covid19 wiped out the boys tournament and none of the games were played. It would have been the third trip for West Jessamine. The Colts have won 60% of their 750 games played over the past twentyfive years (450 wins versus 300 losses). The West Jessamine girls have never won a district or region title and have a combined winning record of 202-458 (30.6%).

East Jessamine girls have won one district championship and been runner up eight times.

Both East and West girls teams have had the misfortune of being paired in the same district and region as Mercer County, which has won sixteen of the seventeen 46th District titles since the current alignment.

East Jessamine girls have a combined record of 261-394 (39.8%) over their twenty-five years. East Jessamine boys have won two district titles and has been runner up nine times. They have never won the region in eleven trips. The Jaguars have a winning record over their twenty-five season, winning 53% of their games (386 wins and 342 losses).

SUMMARY: Now three seasons into the second century of high school basketball in Jessamine County, the county has two schools with great boys and girls programs, offering high-level of competition for the studentathletes of the county. While the game has changed considerably since Nicholasville girls were the state runner up in 1920 (like no longer having a jump ball after every made basket), the wholesome physical attributes of sports, the lifelong discipline and memories, and the school and community pride it creates, has not changed.