EATON — Eaton’s girls basketball team ran its winning streak to a season-high three games after posting a pair of double-digit wins last week.
The Eagles limited visiting Brookville to just 24.4 percent shooting and forced 24 turnovers in a 49-25 win on Thursday, Jan. 5.
Eaton followed that win with a 48-30 win over Hamilton Ross on Saturday in front of the home crowd.
After a slow start against Brookville, Eaton gained control with a 5-0 run midway through the first quarter for a 9-3 lead.
The Eagles opened the second quarter with a 15-0 run and held the Blue Devils to just one field goal the entire quarter as they extended the lead to 30-5 at halftime. The Eagles led by as many as 32 (41-9) with three minutes left in the third.
“For three quarters, I thought we played about as well as we could play. Our defense was suffocating, on offense we played together and took very good care of the ball, as we only had four turnovers through the first three quarters,” Eaton coach Dave Honhart said. “Through the game we had 19 assists, which reflects our willingness to share the ball, and ability to see the floor. Brookville struggles to score the ball, but they are well-coached and fundamentally sound. We did a good job of turning them over.”
Eaton was led by Bailey Shepherd, who scored in 16 points and grabbed six rebounds, while Lexi Miller added 12 points and four rebounds.
Allison Mowen had 5 assists and four rebounds. Becca Mowen led the team with the boards with 10 and added nine points. Annika Gels tossed in seven points and had five rebounds.
Emily Dungan was everywhere on defense, according to Honhart, coming up with 6 steals
“In the fourth quarter, we got some playing time for different people, which was good as everyone on our team works hard and deserves to see the floor,” Honhart said. “It was a strong team effort.”
Against Ross, Eaton raced out to a 10-2 lead less than four minutes into the game and never looked back.
The Eagles held a 22-14 halftime lead, but pushed its lead to 19 (36-17) by the end of the third.
“This has been a fun rivalry over the years with a lot of close games. This year they are down a little bit, but we knew their halfcourt defense and rebounding would be strong,” Honhart said. “I would call our performance a little bit uneven. We played well enough to win and make sure the game never got close. We had some nice moments and teamwork at times, but often we played sloppy on offense (20 turnovers) and soft on the defensive boards (we gave up 18 rebounds.)”
Honhart said to credit Ross for his team’s miscues.
“Certainly Ross deserves credit in both those areas, but we did not play our best basketball – which is hard to do every night. This was one where you take the win and get back to work,” he said.
Gels had a career high 19 points on 6-for-8 shooting (5-of-7 behind the line) and grabbed four rebounds.
Becca Mowen secured nine rebounds and scored eight points and Allison Mowen had eight rebounds and four assists.
Shepherd had 14 points, on 7-of-14 shooting, and three steals.
Miller tossed in six points, grabbed five rebounds and had three assists.
Dungan had three rebounds, three assists and three steals.
Eaton, now 6-7 overall and 2-5 in the Southwestern Buckeye League’s Southwestern Division.
The Eagles will get back into league play this week.
They will visist Oakwood on Thursday, Jan. 10 and Monroe on Saturday. Eaton lost to Oakwood (49-48) on Dec. 8 and to Monroe (52-42) on Dec. 15.
“Both of these were physical, hard faught games at our place back in December. Both times we were ahead in the third quarter, but unable to sustain it. Now we get a chance to find out how much we have improved,” Honhart said. “We look forward to the challenge.”
