Cougar radars scrambled as Falcons close out win from the line

BAINBRIDGE – The last of the four Putnam County teams to get the 2023-24 girls’ basketball season underway finally hit the floor Thursday night as North Putnam hosted North Vermillion.

Trailing most of the game, the Cougars managed to take the lead twice in the final quarter but a woeful shooting night eventually caught up to the hosts as the Falcons scored their last nine points from the free throw line in a 38-34 win.

“If there’s a silver lining to all of this, everything that went wrong on offense are things that can be fixed,” North Putnam head coach Curtis Lawrence said after the team shot 11-of-62 from the field. “We played an outstanding game defensively and all of our issues were on the offensive end.

“We just couldn’t finish. We missed shots and turned the ball over too much in the first half as North Vermillion’s pressure on the ball bothered us. While we have a lot of things to clean up, we’ve got a couple of games Saturday to work on those things.”

North Vermillion started off with a three from Braxtyn Dunham and took a 6-1 lead off a basket from Kayanna Smith and a Dunham free throw.

Lexi Daigle had the sole North Putnam point in that stretch before hitting a jumper to make it 6-3.

Lauren Ellis and Kera Dunham added free throws, the latter adding a score off a steal, to make it 10-3.

Jasmine Duvall hit a three and Hailee Daigle hit two free throws to trim the gap to 10-8 while Melanie Davies scored to end the period as the host trailed 11-10 after eight minutes.

Ellis hit two free throws and Smith scored early to push the lead out to 15-10 but North Putnam pulled back to within one after baskets from Lexi Daigle and Duvall.

Braxtyn and Kera Dunham scored back-to-back baskets to make it a five-point game again with Lexi Daigle adding a pair of free throws before the break as the Falcons led 19-16 at halftime.

Lexi Daigle scored to start the second half but Cadence Dunham scored off a steal and Kera Dunham added a jumper as North Vermillion held on to the lead through most of the third quarter.

North Putnam tied the game at 24-24 on a Mackenzie Mason putback though a late Kera Dunham free throw gave the visitors a 25-24 lead after three quarters of play.

After a 20-turnover first half, the hosts only had six in the third quarter as Lawrence said the girls finally got some of the first-game nerves out of their system.

“This being the first game of the season, we tried to talk to the girls the last couple of days about wanting to play fast but, if we get past pressure and there’s not an easy bucket, we want to slow down on offense,” Lawrence said. “We work on things like that in practice but (North Vermillion’s) have court defense gave us some fits.

“We had a lot of live ball turnovers and errant passes. We settled a bit in the second half but those are things we can clean up in practice.”

Cadence Dunham scored to start the fourth quarter but a putback and a three-point play from Lexi Daigle put the hosts in front for the first time at 29-27.

Smith hit a jumper to tie the game at 29-29 before Rose Haste putback a missed three to make it 31-29 with 4:12 remaining.

Braxtyn Dunham hit a free throw and Ellis added two more to tip the lead back to the Falcons before Hailee Daigle hit a three to make it 34-32.

From there, however, North Putnam’s offense came to a complete halt while North Vermillion attacked the rim repeatedly, getting Ellis and Kera Dunham on the line and the pair knocked down 6-of-8 from the line in the closing minutes to secure the win for the visitors.

While shots simply would not fall for the Cougars, the team rebounded very well as a whole, snapping up 46 boards to the Falcons’ 23.

“We’ve made rebounding an emphasis this year,” Lawrence noted. “We want to control that in every game and did an outstanding job of blocking out, keeping North Vermillion off the boards and limiting their half court sets.”

Scoring

North Vermillion (9-30 2FG; 1-6 3FG; 17-32 FT) — K. Dunham 13, B. Dunham 8, Ellis 6, Smith 6, C. Dunham 4, Bean 1

North Putnam (9-33 2FG; 2-29 3FG; 10-18 FT) — L. Daigle 17, Duvall 7, H. Daigle 5, Davies 2, Haste 2, Osburn 1

Statistics