Clovers stumble against Clay City

Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Cloverdale's Sydney Shrum (No. 21) leaps for one of her 10 rebounds against Clay City on Monday night.

CLAY CITY -- Just a week removed from a meeting at the Toby Yoho Classic tourney held at Eastern Greene High School, Clay City and Cloverdale tangled in round two on Monday evening.

However, the Eels returned leading scorer Carmela Roeschlein to the lineup after she missed the first meeting, a 47-23 Eels' win. The junior guard made a big difference on both ends of the court, but it was her teammate, Brielle Drelick, that did the biggest damage with a 27-point, 10-rebound outburst as Clay City clipped the Clovers, 67-31.

"She's just a really good player," Cloverdale coach Tom Anderson said of Roeschlein. "She's quick, a good ball handler, good shooter and a penetrator and passer. Number five, Brielle Drelick, I'll tell you what, I was impressed with her too. She's a nice shooter, shoots the ball well and they're just quick. (Clay City) has a nice ball club."

Turnovers have been a thorn in Cloverdale's side all season and Clay City's pressure caused all sorts of problems for the Clovers, who fell behind 20-5 after the opening period due to eight turnovers in the quarter.

"Our number one problem is we really have trouble scoring," Anderson said. "We're not a very good shooting team, then we just made way too many turnovers. It's just bad decisions on passes, the old saying, 'be quick, but don't hurry,' well, we hurry. We catch the ball and the first green jersey we saw, we threw it whether they were open or not.

"We talk about it constantly, we never pass fake to where we can move the defense and go to the open person. It's just turn and chuck," he said.

The Eels turned those turnovers into 16 shot attempts over the opening eight minutes as Roeschlein tallied 14 of her 22 points in the period.

In the second period, Cloverdale settled in and played well in spurts, getting five points apiece from Paige Gruener and Sydney Shrum. The Clovers made a run at the Eels to narrow the gap before Drelick started knocking down jumpers. She hit four-of-five shots in the quarter to counter Cloverdale's efforts to narrow the deficit.

Afterwards, Anderson was pretty happy with how his team played once it calmed down and handled the pressure.

"We just play panicky," Anderson said. "When we settle down, we do some nice things. Actually our defense does a pretty nice job. The only way (Clay City) hurt us inside was on offensive rebounds. You gotta rebound, take care of the basketball and we got to shoot better. We do some nice things defensively, but when you give the other team about 30 more chances per game by making bad passes, the other team gets a lot of easy shots."

Clay City continued to take advantage of a strong night of shooting the ball during the second half as Drelick stayed hot, hitting all four shots from the field and three-of-four free throws as the lead grew to 52-27 for Clay City.

Bristy Skiles did knock down a pair of 3-pointers for Cloverdale in the period, including one to end the quarter.

In the final quarter, Clay City's defense remained tight as Cloverdale struggled to a one-for-seven shooting effort from the field. Gruener added her final three points of a nine-point game. Shrum had seven to go with 10 rebounds while both Skiles and Amillia Nally contributed six points.

Cloverdale (0-13 overall) takes on South Vermillion at home on Thursday beginning at 6 p.m.

At Clay City

Cloverdale 5 12 10 4 -- 31

Clay City 20 14 18 15 -- 67

Cloverdale (31)

Gruener 3-14 3-5 9, Nally 3-8 0-0 6, Sinks 0-0 1-2 1, Shrum 2-4 3-5 7, Skiles 2-10 0-0 6, Fulkerson 1-1 0-1 2, Jordan 0-0 0-0 0, Dean 0-1 0-0 0, Woodworth 0-0 0-0 0, Walters 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 11-38 7-13 31.

Clay City (67)

Roeschlein 6-17 7-8 22, Drelick 11-16 5-6 27, Reed 1-2 2-2 4, Miller 3-4 0-0 8, Booe 2-6 0-0 4, Dayhuff 0-0 0-0 0, Gossage 0-2 0-0 0, Riggs 1-3 0-0 2, Durga 0-0 0-0 0, Decker 0-0 0-0 0, Wolfe 0-0 0-0 0. Totals: 24-50 14-17 67.

3-point fieldgoals -- CL 2-14 (Skiles 2-8, Gruener 0-5, Dean 0-1), CC 5-13 (Roeschlein 3-7, Miller 2-3, Booe 0-1, Reed 0-1, Gossage 0-1). Total Rebounds -- CL 27 (Shrum 10, Sinks 5), CC 36 (Drelick 10, Roeschlein 8). Total Fouls -- CL 13, CC 13. Turnovers -- CL 25, CC 18.