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Cloverdale gets consolation victory over Cougars
Cloverdale claimed third place in the Putnam County girls’ basketball tournament on Saturday night, defeating North Putnam 55-19 in the consolation game.
The Clovers outscored North Putnam 13-2 in the first quarter, and extended their lead to 26-5 at halftime and 40-11 after three quarters.
North Putnam coach Jarrod Duff saw improvement in his team.
“Cloverdale came out and did defensively what we have trouble handling, which is pressure us with a trapping defense,” he said. “Our decision-making and taking care of the ball are things we still need to improve upon.“
Duff said there were some specific things his team needs to continue to improve.
“We didn’t use pass fakes often enough, and we threw the first available pass far too often,” he said. “That led to a lot of easy baskets for them. We didn’t do a good enough job of that.
“When they were in man-to-man, we did a little bit better.”
Duff knows his team will continue to see such defensive pressure.
“It’s not something we’re going to give up on, and we’re going to see it the rest of the season,” he said. “I think defensively we did some good things, but we have to fix our problems with taking care of the ball.
“I was proud of our effort, and I thought we competed with them in the second half.”
Cloverdale’s Matthew Langdon knows some of his younger players may have had problems recovering from Friday night’s loss to South Putnam less than 24 hours earlier, as his team was playing its first set of back-to-back nights of the young season.
“Coach Duff did a great job of getting his team to force some turnovers in the first half,” he said. “I talked to our girls about how we started off the season well, and expectations rise. We had a little bit of a letdown after Friday, and our confidence took a hit.”
Langdon said his team fell into a normal situation of playing in a game that teams try their best to avoid.
“We were playing in the 6 p.m. game that teams don’t really want to play in,” he said. “The crowd is smaller, and you have to create your own excitement. We will learn from this tourney and move on.”
He saw improvement in the second half.
“Not necessarily in the amount of points we put up, but we just looked better,” he said. “It looked a little bit more controlled on our part. We need to get to the point where we have the confidence that the other team cannot beat us.”
Abby Walker paced the Clovers with 14 points, while Tori Combs added 12, Kelsey Helterbrand had eight and Sammie Shrum had seven.
Aleah Duncan led North Putnam with eight points.
NORTH PUTNAM (19) — Sims 0-1 1-2 1, Runnels 0-3 0-0 0, Henninger 1-6 2-4 4, Duncan 3-6 0-1 8, Parent 0-3 0-2 0, Lyons 1-5 0-0 2, Spencer 0-8 0-0 0, Dennis 0-3 0-0 0, Osburn 1-1 2-2 4, Sawyer 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 6-37 FG, 5-11 FT, 19 TP
CLOVERDALE (55) — Combs 5-14 2-2 12, Thomas 3-7 0-0 8, Shrum 3-10 1-2 7, Walker 4-10 3-4 14, Helterbrand 2-4 4-6 8, Price 1-2 1-2 3, Shoemaker 1-1 0-0 2, Meek 1-4 1-3 3, McCracken 0-0 0-0 0, Simpson 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 20-50 FG, 11-16 FT, 55 TP
North Putnam 2 3 6 8 — 19
Cloverdale 13 13 14 15 — 55
3-point shooting — Cloverdale 4-16 (Thomas 0-2, Shrum 0-2, Walker 3-9, Meek 1-3), NP 2-9 (Runnels 0-2, Duncan 2-4, Tennis 0-2). Turnovers — NP 30, Cloverdale 20.
Next game — North Putnam (0-6) plays at South Vermilion on Tuesday, while Cloverdale (4-2) hosts Eastern Greene on Saturday afternoon.