Eagles use offensive balance to knock back Athenians

The South Putnam Lady Eagles used a balance offense, aggressive early defense and an unselfish brand of basketball to defeat the Crawfordsville Athenians 45-28 in a non-conference girls’ high school basketball game at the “Eagles Nest” on Tuesday night.

South picked up scoring contributions from eight different players and turned Crawfordville over 15 times in the first half to slowly extend a lead to double digits and then fought through an aggressive Crawfordsville defense in the second half to improve to 4-4, while the Athenians dropped to 2-7 on the year.

“I thought we moved the ball well tonight, played unselfishly and got some easy looks,” South Putnam head coach Brian Gardner said.

“We didn’t play very well early, but for the last quarter and a half, we picked it up. From the timeout (in the third quarter) to end the game, we outscored (South Putnam). That was against their starters and we can use that to build on,” Crawfordsville head coach Tyler Smith said.

Crawfordsville’s Taylor Abston scored the first bucket of the game for the Athenians, but that would be the last lead they would have as the Eagles’ ball movement was able to find Lillian Emmerich repeatedly and the sophomore made Crawfordsville pay with 10 first-quarter points.

“We worked against the 1-3-1 defense and Lilly did a really good job of finding the opening on the back side of it,” Gardner said as the Eagles would lead 10-5 after the first stoppage in play.

South would open the second quarter with a 10-2 run as Chlara Pistelli would score four quick points and the Eagle defense repeatedly forced turnovers.

An Ariel Dooley three-pointer forced an Athenian timeout. Abston hit a jumper to close the gap to 20-9, but Kelsey Custis would hit a buzzer-beater at the half for a 22-9 Eagle lead at the break.

“We did some good things defensively. We were working pretty hard and did a lot of things we wanted to,” Gardner said as his team allowed just four second quarter points.

The early part of the third quarter looked like a repeat of the second quarter. South would score the first seven points of the period forcing another Athenian timeout with the Eagles in command at 31-9.

Crawfordsville would make a small run of its own to finish the quarter on a 10-5 run with Madison Hedrick and Abston leading the way with four points each, but Joscelyn Pilcher found the range offensively with five points and South would still lead 36-19 heading into the fourth period.

The game slowed down in the fourth quarter, largely due to a significant number of fouls called. The Eagles took advantage as they hit their free throws or found Custis for a bucket. Custis had six points in the quarter as the Eagles would eventually win the game 45-28 with both teams notching nine points in the period.

“It was really good to see us come out early with some energy and success,” Gardner said.

The Eagles balanced scoring had Custis leading the way with 11, Emmerich with 10 and Pilcher added nine points and 10 rebounds.

“We can be pretty successful when we have girls scoring like they did tonight. Kelsey had 11, Lilly 10, Joscelyn nine and then five by Chlara,” Gardner said.

Crawfordsville’s Abston led the visitors with 10 points and Hedrick with eight, but the Athenians struggled at the stripe, hitting just 33 percent (6-of-18) from the free throw line.

“We are normally a good free throw shooting team, we just didn’t have a good night,” Smith said.

South will have tough weekend as they as they have two Western Indiana Conference road games (at North Putnam and at Brown County), while Crawfordsville will host Lebanon and Attica on Friday and Saturday.

CRAWFORDSVILLE (28) –Widmer 1-6 1-7 3, Gardner 2-7 0-1 4, Hodges 1-5 0-0 3, M. Hedrick 2-5 3-6 8, Abston 4-19 2-4 10, Pierce 0-1 0-0 0, Moore 0-3 0-0 0, O. Hedrick 0-0 0-0 0, Huesca 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 10-46 FG, 6-18 FT, 28 TP.

SOUTH PUTNAM (45) – Cline 1-5 0-0 2, Gardner 2-5 0-0 4, Pilcher 2-8 4-4 9, Emmerich 4-10 1-2 10, Custis 5-11 0-0 11, Pistelli 1-6 2-2 5, Dooley 1-1 0-0 3, Jeter 0-0 0-0 0, Holderfield 0-0 0-0 0, Phillips 0-0 1-2 1, Wallace 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 16-46 FG, 8-10 FT, 45 TP.

3-point shooting – CHS 7-2-12 (Widmer 0-2, Gardner 0-1, Hodges 1-4, M. Hedrick 1-3, Abston 0-2), SP 5-17 (Cline 0-1, Pistelli 1-3, Pilcher 1-5, Emmerich 1-4, Custis 1-3, Dooley 1-1) Rebounds – CHS 38 (Widmer 6, Gardner 5, Hodges 5, M. Hedrick 6, Abston 5, Pierce 3, Moore 3) SP – 35 (Cline 3, Pistelli 4, Gardner 4, Phillips 1, Pilcher 10, Emmerich 1, Custis 4, Dooley 3, Jeter 2) FG Pct. – CHS 21.7, SP 34.8. FT Pct. – CHS 33.3, SP 80.0. Turnovers – CHS 22, SP 22.