|
|
|
|
Punxsy's third-quarter run knocks out Lady Bisons for good |
|
|
|
Written by Dan Walk
|
|
Thursday, 25 January 2007 |
 The Lady Chucks' Lauren Martino takes a shot Wednesday in Punxsy's 56-35 win over Clearfield. (Photo by Dan Walk)
By Dan Walk Of The Spirit
PUNXSUTAWNEY - Clearfield scored two points with 5:03 left in the third quarter Wednesday to take its first lead since the opening minutes of the game. At that point, it was 22-21 Lady Bisons, but the always-resilient Lady Chucks found a way to remove any possibility of back-to-back losses with a 18-2 run to close the third stanza.
A few minutes into the fourth quarter, Punxsy's 18-2 run turned into a 24-4 run, and just eight minutes after Clearfield took a one-point lead, it was staring at 19-point deficit with five minutes left in the game.
The 20-point run was too much for the Lady Bisons, and in the end, the Lady Chucks added another District IX victory with a 56-35 win Wednesday.
"We made better decisions with the basketball," Punxsy head coach Randy Reitz said of how his team was able to turn things around in the third quarter. "The passes were a lot crisper, we ran the lanes, we moved the ball a lot better against the zone, and defensively, we stepped it up."
The first half of the game featured many tie-ups that turned into jump-ball situations. As the possession arrow went back and forth, the Lady Chucks had trouble putting points on the board.
Punxsutawney (14-1, 7-0 in D9 League) led 12-7 after the first quarter, but much like its last game against Northern Cambria last Friday - Punxsy scored five points in the second quarter - the Lady Chucks suffered in the second stanza. Punxsutawney scored just six points, but held Clearfield (9-6, 4-3 in D9 League) to eight points, which led to a low-scoring 18-15 score in favor of the home team.
"We weren't attacking the zone, we weren't moving into the open areas, and we had turnovers against their full-court press," Reitz said. "We just
weren't moving into the gaps, and were trying to dribble the ball when you have to pass."
That's where the similarities to last Friday's game disappeared. Punxsutawney scored just seven points in the third quarter last Friday, but put 21 points on the board in the third quarter against Clearfield Wednesday.
"I thought the girls did a great job in the second half, breaking that full-court press by passing the ball, moving into the gaps to get some easy layups," Reitz said. "We kind of wore them down a little bit in the third quarter. They got a little bit tired. We still had our legs, and were able to create some turnovers off our defensive pressure."
The more the Lady Bisons wore down, the stronger the Lady Chucks became. Punxsy started to create more turnovers, and the Lady Chucks beat Clearfield down the floor for easy layups.
"I think our kids are very well-conditioned," Reitz said. "They do a good job in practice of getting up and down the floor, and I think you can see it in the games - in the fourth quarter, we still have our stamina."
Punxsutawney's starting forwards - Lauren Martino and Amanda Wehrle - combined for 36 points, one more than Clearfield had overall.
Martino had a game-high 20 points, and Wehrle followed with 16 points.
Reitz said that stopping Brooke Jordan's outside shooting and dribble penetration, along with Elizabeth Sopic's rebounding and offensive presence on the inside, were keys to the game.
Sopic had 11 points, and Jordan had seven points.
"Overall, I thought we did a nice job of stopping their dribble penetration," Reitz said. "I thought we did a nice job keeping Sopic off the boards. The girls accomplished what we wanted to do."
Just as the varsity girls, the junior-varsity team picked up a victory, 40-35.
The girls trailed 34-29 with about five minutes left in the fourth quarter before closing the game on a 11-1 run.
Emily Thompson had a game-high 13 points, including 9-for-11 from the free-throw line.
Amber Byerly had a team-high 12 points for the Lady Bisons.
The Lady Chucks now enter the toughest part of their schedule. Punxsy travels to D9 League's second-place team, Bradford, Friday before hosting Class AAAA Altoona Monday.
Then, Punxsutawney takes a two-game road trip to the usually-competitive Brookville Feb. 1 and highly-touted Elk County Catholic Feb. 7.
While Reitz understands the next four games will be very difficult, he is concentrating on just Bradford for now.
"It's a tough stretch, and we'll take them one game at a time, and get ready for Bradford Friday night," he said. "Hopefully, we'll go up there and play well for four quarters - not two and a half - because that's that type of game we're going to need to defeat a very good basketball team. They're playing pretty well right now, and they have some very good shooters." |
|
Last Updated ( Friday, 26 January 2007 )
|
|
|
|
