The Prairie boys picked the wrong time to travel north to visit the Kennedy gym Tuesday night.

The previously ranked Cougars came out of the gate with gusto on both offense and defense and simply hammered the Hawks, 71-38.

It might have been even more lopsided if subs hadn’t played much of the fourth quarter on both sides.

“This is the first game we really put the offense and defense together,” said Kennedy Coach Jon McKowen. “There have been times when we’ve had one or the other. But tonight we had both.”

Prairie bruiser JoJo Simpson scored the first basket of the night on a nifty dipsy-doodle under the rim. After that, it was Kennedy (7-3, 4-2) the rest of the way.

The Cougars reeled off 12 straight points, six of them on consecutive 3-pointers and four more on breakaway layups. They led 24-11 after one quarter and 37-20 at halftime.

“We shored up our defense by keeping people in front of us,” McKowen explained. “We were finding the open guys on offense. And they were hitting their open shots.”

Senior swingman Bryton Heisler knocked down three long ones in the first half to go along with two other baskets for 13 of his team-high 17 points. “Give credits to our guards,” he said. “They were penetrating the lane and then kicking it out. As a team, this was overall our best game.”

Kennedy connected on 11 treys for the night. And of 29 total field goals, 19 of them came with an assist.

That, said McKowen, showed how adept the Cougars were on sharing the ball. They also locked down with a smothering defense, holding the Hawks (5-5, 3-4) to 10 points or less in every quarter but the opening fast-paced period.

“Our defense starts our offense,” said Heisler.

On this night, anyway, both were superb. “I think we were able to take advantage of our speed and depth,” McKowen noted.

In only his third game with the varsity, silky smooth freshman Derrick Diggins came off the bench midway through the first quarter and hit a 3-pointer and a long two-pointer at the buzzer for Kennedy.

With another 3-pointer and a driving floater, he scored 10 points on 4-for-4 shooting and dished off to Heisler in the corner for an assist.

Diggins, who has seen more playing time each game, said he was concentrating more on his ballhandling and defense.

“I try to play knuckle-down defense and get the ball to the guys who are open,” he said. “I look for the pass first. But if I’m open, I think I can knock down the shot.”

Diggins finished with 10 points. Brendon Manning notched 15 points for the Cougars. Cole Murdock scored 10.

PRAIRIE (38): Cal Clark 0 4-4 4, Maxwell Smith Drahos 5 2-3 13, Jalen Rima 3 1-2 8, Benjamin Boldt 1 0-0 2, JoJo Simpson 3 1-3 7, Bryce Meeker 0 0-0 0, Austin Fisher 0 1-2 1, Mitch Lorenz 1 0-0 3, Ethan Copeland 0 0-0 0. Totals 13 9-14 38.

KENNEDY (72): Zach Daniels 2 0-0 5, Bryton Heisler 7 0-2 17, Cole Murdock 3 2-2 10, Brendon Manning 7 0-0 15, Drake Brewster 2 0-0 4, Derrick Diggins 4 0-0 10, Matt Gardner 1 0-0 2, Max Techau 1 1-2 3, Derek Girling 0 0-0 0, Adam Wall 0 0-0 0, Curtis Odum 0 0-0 0, Mike Bisenius 1 0-0 3, Rey’ez Bell 0 0-0 0, Terrence Hall 0 0-0 0, Jacob Ross 1 0-0 2. Totals 29 3-6 72.

Halftime – Kennedy 37, Prairie 20. 3-point goals – Prairie 3 (Drahos 1, Rima 1, Lorenz 1), Kennedy 10 (Heisler 3, Diggins 2, Murdock 2, Daniels 1, Bisenius 1, Manning 1). Total fouls – Prairie 7, Kennedy 14. Fouled out –none.