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Eagles, Clovers pick up road victories; NP, Greencastle lose
ROCKVILLE — The South Putnam Eagle girls’ basketball team opened their season on Tuesday night at Rockville.
The Eagles were to open last week against Clay City, but that game was postponed to December. The Lady Eagles certainly looked ready with a big first quarter (19-7), leading to a 44-42 victory.
“With our athleticism and guard play, we wanted to pressure the ball. We also attacked the rim well early,” South Putnam head coach Brian Gardner said.
The Eagles jumped out to a 12-2 lead as they cruised to a 19-7 first quarter lead. The Eagles had five players score in the quarter and forced the Rox into eight turnovers starting the game. Lily Stein had eight of her 13 points in the quarter as South pressured the ball forced the tempo.
“We did a lot of good things in that first quarter that we have been practicing. It was big for us getting some momentum,” Gardner said.
The Eagles’ hot start tailed off as the Rox began to use their significant size advantage inside to begin to chip away at the lead.
Rockville began to pound the ball inside to their 5-foot-11 post players in the second quarter. The tandem of Baylee Breedlove and Kassidy Frazier scored nine of the Rox’ 13 points as they cut into the lead and trailed at the half 28-20.
“Sometimes as the game goes on, you tend to fall back into some bad habits and we did that a little after the first quarter. They settled down and got to doing some good things like getting the ball inside to the Breedlove girl,” Gardner said.
Rockville came out in the second half and made a run at the Eagles. The Rox scored the first six points of the half leading to an Eagle timeout. After the timeout, South found its stride again reeling off seven straight points to build their lead back to nine points at 35-26 behind to quick layups by Aubrey Barker. The quarter was a series of runs, as the Rox closed the quarter with a 6-2 run to trail the Eagles 37-34 heading into the final stanza.
The Eagles couldn’t pull away in the final quarter, but they also never lost the lead. South led wire-to-wire in the game but couldn’t put the Rox away.
Rockville continued to pound the ball inside to Breedlove, who scored six of her game-high 22 points in the final quarter.
“We have to defend the right way against a big team that wants to go inside. We need to pressure the ball and attack the passers. We can’t gamble, we have to shore that up,” Gardner said.
South was outscored in each of the final three quarters, but the hot start was enough to give the Eagles the win. South struggled shooting the ball at times during the game.
The Eagles shot just 29 percent from the field and also struggled from the charity stripe. They hit just four of nine free throws for the game and that included the front end of three one-and-bonus opportunities in the fourth quarter.
“For us to come in here and shoot 30 percent from the field, 4-9 from the line and just 20 percent on threes and get a win is big for us,” Gardner said.
SOUTH PUTNAM (44) – Bieghler 3-9 0-2 7, Nichols 1-5 0-0 2, Stein 6-17 1-2 13, Barker 6-9 1-3 14, McHugh 1-6 0-0 2, Capps 2-9 2-2 6, Boswell 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 17-59 FG, 4-9 FT, 44 TP.
ROCKVILLE (42) – M. Duggar 0-1 0-0 0, Carrington 4-12 1-2 10, Breedlove 8-17 6-10 22, T.Duggar 1-3 2-2 4, Buell 1-1 0-0 2, Frazier 2-5 0-0 4, Pierce 0-1 0-2 0. Totals 16-40 FG,9-16 FT, 42 TP.
South Putnam 19 9 9 7 – 44
Rockville 7 13 14 8 – 58
3-point shooting – SP 2-11 (Barker 1-2, Bieghler 1-2, Stein 0-5, McHugh 0-1, Capps 0-1), RHS 1-5 (Carrington 1-3, Breedlove 0-1, Pierce 0-1) FG Pct. – SP 28.8, RHS 40.0. FT Pct. – SP 44.4, RHS 56.3. Turnovers – SP 16, RHS 21.
JV game – Rockville 30, South Putnam 21.
Next game — South Putnam (1-0) plays at Edgewood on Friday.
In other girls’ action on Tuesday:
• Cloverdale 72, North Central 42 — At Farmersburg, the Clovers used a balanced scoring attack with four players in double figures in improving their record to 2-1.
Abby Walker and Kelsey Helterbrand led the Clovers with 16 points each, while Tori Combs added 13 and Sammie Shrum had 11.
Helterbrand added nine rebounds, while Hailey Thomas had seven assists (with no turnovers) and five steals. Combs also had six steals.
“With this young of a group, I was very interested to see how we bounced back from a tough loss to Riverton Parke [on Friday], and we couldn’t be happier with how the girls came in and practiced on Saturday,” Cloverdale coach Matthew Langdon said. “That loss seemed to make them want to win even more. Our response on a long road to North Central was that we came out and played really well.”
Langdon used a rotation of eight players deep due to some early foul trouble.
“It was a really good win,” he said. “We weren’t able to jump on them early and they kept it close early. We had an explosion in the second quarter [with 23 points] and got up by 20 at halftime.”
The Clovers improved to 2-1 with the win.
“We know we still have a lot of work to do with some of the opponents we have coming up,” he said. “Especially a tough county tourney next weekend. The girls are excited to see how much they can improve.”
CLOVERDALE (72) — Couch 1 0-0 2, Helterbrand 4 8-9 16, Shrum 3 5-8 11, Rightmyer 0 0-0 0, Simpson 1 0-0 2, Walker 5 3-5 16, Meek 1 1-2 3, Combs 6 1-3 13, Thomas 1 3-4 5, Shoemaker 1 0-0 2, Price 1 0-1 2. Totals 24 FG, 21-32 FT, 72 TP
NORTH CENTRAL (42) — Moody 1 3-4 5, Chilton 1 0-0 2, Cano 0 0-0 0, Dunn 0 0-0 0, E.Shroyer 0 1-2 1, R.Shroyer 7 11-15 25, Stone 3 2-6 7, Saso 0 0-0 0. Totals 12 FG, 17-27 FT, 42 TP
Cloverdale 18 23 21 10 — 72
North Central 10 12 6 14 — 42
3-point goals — Walker 3, Stone.
Next game — Cloverdale (2-1) plays at Shakamak on Saturday night.
• Owen Valley 60, Greencastle 33 — At Greencastle, the Patriots jumped out to a 23-8 lead after one quarter on their way to the victory.
Owen Valley used a combination of full-court and half-court trapping defenses to force Greencastle in to seven first-half turnovers and 14 more in the second half.
Owen Valley led 34-18 at halftime and 63-24 after three quarters.
Gracie Smith and Claire Gillen led the Tiger Cubs with eight points each, while Jalyn Duff added four.
The Tiger Cubs were able to get to the free-throw line 34 times, but could only come away with 16 points.
Abigail Herrington led three Owen Valley players in double figures with 12 points, followed by Dazia Drake with 11 and Payton Cattorini with 10.
OWEN VALLEY (60) — Drake 4 3-3 11, Cattorini 4 1-1 10, Wesley 0 0-0 0, Johnson 3 2-4 8, Schafer 1 0-0 3, Truax 0 0-0 0, Herrington 5 0-0 12, Farris 0 0-0 0, Godwin 3 1-2 7. Totals 24 FG, 7-10 FT, 33 TP
GREENCASTLE (33) — Stoffregen 0 2-4 2, Robinson 0 3-4 3, White 1 0-0 2, Weliever 0 1-2 1, Nally 0 0-1 0, Shuee 0 0-1 0, Duff 1 1-2 4, A.Stevens 1 0-0 2, Smith 2 4-8 8, Gillen 2 4-10 8, Ray 1 1-2 3. Totals 8 FG, 16-34 FT, 33 TP
Owen Valley 23 11 19 7 — 60
Greencastle 8 10 6 9 — 33
3-point goals — Duff, Cattorini, Schafer, Mitchell, Herrington 2. Total fouls — Owen Valley 25, Greencastle 11.
Next game — Greencastle (0-3) plays at Beech Grove at 1:30 p.m. on Saturday.
• Crawfordsville 47, North Putnam 30 — At Crawfordsville, the Athenians led 9-4 after one period and gradually pulled away to a 17-point win.
The Athenians extended their lead to 24-8 at halftime and 36-14 after three periods, before the Cougars won the final quarter 16-11.
Freshman Baylee Osburn led the Cougars with nine points, while Kinzey Young had seven and Payton Lyons and Dana Tennis added four each.
Emilee Henninger and Bronwyn Spencer each had three rebounds to pace the Cougars, while Lyndi Parent and Aleah Duncan each had two assists.
NORTH PUTNAM (30) — Duncan 0 0-0 0, Sims 0 0-0 0, Runnels 0 0-2 0, Young 2 3-3 7, Osburn 4 1-2 9, Lyons 2 0-0 4, O’Neal 0 0-2 0, Gibson 0 0-0 0, Parent 1 0-0 2, Henninger 1 0-2 2, Tennis 2 0-0 4, Sawyer 0 0-0 0, Spencer 1 0-0 2. Totals 13 FG, 4-11 FT, 30 TP
CRAWFORDSVILLE (47) — Francis 0 0-0 0, Kellerman 3 0-2 7, Castro 4 1-2 9, Lynas 0 0-3 0, Walbert 3 1-6 7, Barnett 1 3-4 5, Laskowski 5 2-2 13, Tomlinson 2 0-0 4, Rivers 1 0-0 2, Livesay 0 0-0 0. Totals 19 FG, 7-19 FT, 47
North Putnam 4 4 6 16 — 30
Crawfordsville 9 15 12 11 — 47
3-point goals — Kellerman, Laskowski. Total fouls — North Putnam 13, Crawfordsville 10. Turnovers — North Putnam 22, Crawfordsville 18.
JV game — North Putnam 38 (Jaden Day 14, Kinzey Young 11), Crawfordsville 20 .
Next game — North Putnam (0-2) hosts Monrovia on Thursday.