PREBLE COUNTY — Twin Valley South and Tri-County North girls faced off against each other, with South earning their third victory on the year when they beat their rival 31-20 on Thursday, Dec. 10.
“This was a nice league win for us. Especially being a rivalry game on our home floor,” said South head coach Jeff Case. “I was really happy with our defensive energy. We are still working though some kinks on offense but we had decent flow tonight.”
Both teams got into foul trouble early on and South’s bench stepped up and helped the team jump out to an early lead.
After North drew first blood, South went on to score the next 11 points of the quarter, taking an 11-2 lead into the second.
Then continued to slowly build on that lead in the second quarter, outscoring North 8-6 in that frame and taking a 19-8 lead into halftime.
“We were in foul trouble early and we weren’t handling the ball well,” said North’s head coach Jessica Cherry. “We kept running into the traps and not utilizing our bigs to help push the ball up the court. South never looked back and took full advantage of our mistakes.”
It was much of the same for the rest of the game, with the third quarter only seeing six points in total from both teams. In the fourth, South put up 10 points while North had their biggest offensive output on the night, scoring eight.
“We are still learning and we had to learn to play with the lead almost the whole game. They did a nice job answering a couple of runs that North put together. This is all part of the process,” said Case.
It was the second win in a row for South who improved to 3-5 on the year. They were led Mylan Crews with 10 points, six steals and five assists. Morgan Newhart added eight rebounds.
For North, Cassi Stinson led the team with six points, two steals, and eight rebounds. Riley Cruse added six points and eight rebounds while Shyanna Baker had three points and eight boards.
Other games
Earlier in the week, North also faced off against Eaton, losing 61-31. Stinson had 18 points, two assists, and four rebounds. Sara Harris added six points on the night as well. The shot 60 percent from the free throw line but had 36 turnovers.
They also lost to Arcanum 61-6 later in the week. Stinson had three points, Baker had two, and Preston Lipinski had one.
They were scheduled to play Brookville on Monday, Dec. 14 before traveling to Bradford on Thursday, Dec. 17 for a 5:30 tip-off. They also host Franklin Monroe on Monday, Dec. 21 at 5:30 p.m.
For South, they played Jefferson before their match-up with North, winning that game 52-24. Their defense forced 47 turnovers in the contest.
They were led by Crews and Abby Creech, who both had nine steals. Crews also added 10 rebounds on the night as well.
They were scheduled to play Stivers on Monday, Dec. 14 before traveling to Arcanum on Thursday, Dec. 17 for a 5:30 p.m. game. They also travel to Franklin Monroe on Saturday, Dec. 19 for a noon tip-off.
