Clover girls, Edgewood boys both win big in WIC openers

Tori Combs hauls in a rebound on Friday night.

Chuck Hess photo

CLOVERDALE — Both Edgewood and Cloverdale had a team entering the night at No. 12 in the state rankings on Friday night, and the favorites justified those positions with big wins in the Western Indiana Conference season-opening doubleheader.

In the girls’ game, the Clovers never trailed after being down 4-3 and went on to record a 55-33 victory.

The Edgewood boys’ team may have set some shooting percentage records, at least on this night, with an 88-47 win.

Cloverdale’s 1-2 inside punch of Tori Combs and Lakkain Price proved fatal for the Mustangs early, yet neither was the high scorer.

Junior long-range specialist Kassie Wade led the Clovers with 13 points, hitting three treys among her five baskets.

Hailey Thomas added 12 points for the winners, while Combs had 11 and Price had eight as the Clovers improved to 9-1.

The Clovers held a 15-8 lead at the first stop, keyed by two Wade treys, and dominated the second period by a 12-4 margin for a 27-12 halftime lead.

Combs had five points and eight rebounds in the period, surpassing the 1,000 mark in career rebounds. She passed that similar milestone in scoring earlier this year.

Cloverdale still led by 15 at the final stop, after an evenly-played third period, but broke the game even wider open in the final period.

“I was really proud of the girls and their defensive effort,” Clover coach Matthew Langdon said. “On Tuesday night against North Putnam, they did a lot of good things against us and we didn’t play well on the defensive end. They responded so well in this game.

“Edgewood does a great job of driving to the basket, and we did a good job of holding them to 33 points.”

Langdon thought his team’s turnovers limited its offensive performance.

“We got in too much of a rush at times,” he said. “Kassie Wade was able to knock down some shots for us, and Hailey was able to get to the line quite a bit. Overall, any time you get a win in this conference it’s a great thing.”

Langdon also noted that he was sure Combs is now the only player in school history to have attained both 1,000 points and rebounds.

“That’s really neat to see her get that, and it’s a great accomplishment,” he said.

While the outcome of the girls’ game was not clear early on, the Mustang boys left no doubt as to the night they were going to have.

They poured in 22 first-quarter points, getting six each from sophomores Trevor Taylor and Coleman Sater and five more from senior point guard Joe Kido.

Edgewood scored the first 11 points of the second period, and cruised to a 44-24 halftime lead by winning each of the first two quarters by 22-12 margins.

The Mustangs were just getting warmed up, with 25 more points in the third period and 19 more in the fourth quarter.

For the game, Edgewood hit an incredible 35 of 51 field goal attempts, with an even more incredible total of 14 out of 23 3-point attempts.

Parker Watts goes up for a 3-pointer against Edgewood on Friday night.

Chuck Hess photo

Sater and Taylor each finished with 19 points, while Derek Farkas added 14, Kido had 13 and Kyle Rogers added 10 more.

Kyle Thomas paced Cloverdale with 19 points, while Parker Watts added 14.

While Clover coach Patrick Rady thought his team could have played better in every facet of the game, Edgewood was so dominant that whatever the Clovers did or didn’t do was not a factor.

“They were unselfish on both ends of the floor,” Rady said of the Mustangs. “I thought they made the extra pass and on the defensive end they had great ball pressure and help. They just beat us on both ends of the floor.”

Senior forward Jake Wilkes was severely limited by playing time, seeing only 1:06 of court time in the first half due to foul trouble.

Rady got a bright spot with the play off the bench of sophomore Chase Ashcraft, who added four points for the Clovers.

“He’s a high-energy guy, and he makes things happen,” he said. “He has been working hard to get better.”

The Clovers don’t have a lot of time to fret about this defeat, as they travel to Southmont tonight.

The Mounties were winless until beating North Montgomery on Friday night, but got their top returning scorer back for that game and Rady is looking forward to seeing how his team responds.

“There are two things that will tell me a lot about this team,” he said. “How do we come out when the ball is thrown up — do we still execute and play hard on the defensive end — and how hard we practice on Monday. That’s a good team, but we have too many flaws now that we have to fix.

“We have a mixture of seniors and youth, so it’s not just because we are a young team,” Rady added. “It’s only two games into the season, though. We have a long way to go.”

GIRLS

EDGEWOOD (33) — Meyer 0-2 0-0 0, Powell 0-4 0-0 0, SPear 3-6 1-2 7, Minnick 2-5 0-1 4, Helms 6-12 2-4 14, Love 0-0 0-0 0 Sherfield 3-7 0-4 6, Pace 1-3 0-0 2. Totals 15-39 FG, 3-11 FT, 33 TP

CLOVERDALE (55) — Combs 4-11 3-5 11, Shrum 1-11 0-0 2, Thomas 2-5 7-12 12, Price 3-6 2-4 8, Wade 5-10 0-0 13, Shoemaker 3-3 0-2 6, Lewellen 1-1 0-0 3. Totals 19-44 FG, 12-23 FT, 55 TP

3-point goals — Thomas 1, Wade 3.

BOYS

EDGEWOOD (88) — 8-11 0-0 19 Kido 5-6 1-1 13, Balcam 2-2 0-0 6, Sater 8-12 3-5 19, Banister 2-4 0-2 4, Farkas 5-8 0-0 14, Schwartz 0-0 0-2 0, Rodgers 4-8 0-0 10, Slabaugh 1-1 0-0 3. Totals 35-51 FG, 4-10 FT, 88 TP

CLOVERDALE (47) — Thomas 7-18 2-4 19, Watts 4-9 2-2 13, Wilkes 1-3 0-0 2, N.Kelley 2-9 0-0 4, J.Kelley 2-6 1-1 5, Sims 0-0 0-2 0, Cornelius 0-1 0-0 0, Ashcraft 2-4 0-0 4, Hall 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 18-50 FG, 5-7 FT, 47 TP.

3-point goals — Taylor 3, Kido 2, Balcam 2, Farkas 4, Rodgers 2, Slabaugh, Thomas 3, Watts 3.