Friday, 11-28-2003  at Chesterton

CROWN POINT (27)  Kaitlyn Sertich 1-2-4, Blayre Reeves 0-0-0, Stephanie Sandilla 0-0-0, Jill Weiand 2-1-5, Mallory Michaels 0-0-0, Hannah Plumley 0-0-0, Cassie Pruzin 6-0-12, Jackie Clements 2-2-6, Angelica Rospond  0-0-0, Courtney Perry 0-0-0.   TOTALS: 11-5-27.

FGS: 11-60, 18.3 percent.
FTS: 5-14, 35.7 percent:  Sertich 2-6, Weiand 1-3, Pruzin 0-3, Clements 2-2
REBOUNDS (23) Weiand 8, Pruzin 5, Sandilla 4.
ASSISTS: Cassie Pruzin - 4
TURNOVERS: 12
STEALS: Cassie Pruzin - 6
FOULED OUT: None
3-POINT GOALS (0) None.

CHESTERTON (36)  Holly Martin 1-2-4, Stephanie Boyle 0-6-6, Catherine Campbell 2-1-5, Alicia Babcock 2-0-6, Kelly Pellar 4-4-12, Christine Vidimos 0-1-1, Heather Banghart 1-0-2, Madeline Wilk 0-0-0.  TOTALS: 10-14-36.

FGS: 10-38, 26.3 percent
FTS: 14-21, 66.7 percent - Melton 2-2,  Pellar 4-5, Boyle 6-10, Campbell 1-2, Vidimos 1-2.
REBOUNDS (29) Boyle 7, Vidimos 7, Campbell 5
ASSISTS: Campbell - 3
TURNOVERS: 21
STEALS: Boyle - 3
FOULED OUT: none
3-POINT GOALS (2) Alicia Babcock 2.

CHESTERTON (11-28-2003) -  Numbers are fun. I like to play with them. Last Friday night, Crown Point's many pressing defenses forced 21 turnovers from Duneland Athletic Conference (DAC) rival Chesterton, holding the Trojans to just 11 field goals and only 36 points. The Lady Bulldogs fired up a robust 60 shots from the field and two nice men in striped shirts donated 14 free throws to the Crown Point cause.

CP never led.

As the Bulldog bus disappeared behind snow flurries into the Porter County darkness about 9:30 p.m., it carried just four girls who scored at all in CP's very ugly 36-27 loss at Chesterton.

To be fair, Chesterton (3-0) is a good defensive team. They have decent size and five senior regulars. But Crown Point shot a stunning 11 of 60 from the floor and iced that cake with 5-of-14 from the foul line. It was scary how badly they shot the ball.

"I though we played very hard," said long time CP coach Tom May. "We got 60 shots. That's pretty good. But quite honestly, we have a lot of kids who didn't shoot the ball over the summer. They played a couple of times a week and traveled and played in different locations. But the old days, where you took 300-400 shots a day and got your shooting in. Kids don't do that anymore. Everything we're doing is working, but it comes down to putting the ball in the basket. Right now, there's no magic formula to make this better."

Both coaches were looking for some kind of formula after suffering through some truly sub-par offense. Chesterton veteran coach Jack Campbell watched his team hit just 10 of 38 from the floor, but saved the day with 14 of 21 from the line. He thought it might be a product of a league of defensive styles.

"Well, we had more than they did," he said in the hallway of the new Chesterton high school. "When we play them (CP), its going to get ugly. When we play Valpo, it can get ugly. The defenses are so much better than the offenses. We both put a lot of pressure on the ball. Pressure on the entry passes. We make it difficult to run your offense. Tonight, they got some turnovers but they didn't get points off them. That's a lot of their offense. They didn't get turnover baskets or turnover foul shots."

Both teams could have won by large margins. After a relatively normal first period, the Lady Bulldog attack went silent and Chesterton ran off nine points in a row to lead 18-7 with 3:20 left in the half. After Jill Weiand scored on a short jump shot to cut the lead to nine, Chesterton senior Catherine (Cat) Campbell would be the only player to score the rest of the half.

The slow-moving Lady Bulldogs seemed to be going through some kind of post-Thanksgiving turkey withdrawal in the first two periods, but they came alive physically in the second half, forcing 15 Chesterton turnovers.  Trailing 25-12, CP junior guard Cassie Pruzin scored on a baseline drive with 4:58 left in the third period. Pruzin, who averaged 15 points in CP's first four games, fed junior Kaitlyn Sertich for a short shot and converted on another driving layup to make it 25-16.

A basket and two foul shots from 5-9 sophomore Jackie Clements closed the lead to 27-21 with 7:20 left in the game before a bizarre four minute sequence where nobody scored. The Lady Bulldogs had two four shot possessions during that time and CP snatched some of Chesterton's 10 fourth quarter turnovers in that mind-numbing period.

"We'd miss layups," said May. "We generated easy shots. The frustration comes from missing easy shots. We'd miss five foot shots. We'd miss 10-foot shots. We held them to one basket in six minutes (the final six minutes of the third quarter) but we only made up two points. But you become much more confident when the ball goes in. It didn't go in and it hasn't been going in."

When a team averages 67 shots a game and 50 points a game, the winds of lineup change are beginning to blow. May played 10 players in the first half Friday trying to find someone who could make a basket. "We told them," he said, "that it's our responsibility as coaches to produce defenses and offenses that give them more chances to score than the other team. It is their responsibility to put the ball in the basket. Right now, they're not doing that."

LADY BULLDOG NOTES:  About 300 fans watched the CP-Chesterton game on a cold snowy holiday night.  Coach Jack Campbell was asked what he would tell his girls after a win like this. "We'll sit around and have some snacks and watch the tape," he said.

"We'll point out the good things we did and then we'll move on. We've got Wheeler (3-1) and they're a good team. Then we've got Merrillville next Friday."

Crown Point got 75 shots from the floor in the season opener against Hebron, 77 at Kankakee Valley,  59 against Portage and 65 on the road at then top- ranked Warsaw. Consider the 60 CP shots against Chesterton and you would think that the Lady Bulldogs will eventually be a potent offensive club. It is virtually impossible to average almost 70 shots from the field in a 32-minute high school game involving big schools. But the combination of Pruzin and Sertich being very difficult to press and CP's own pressure defense rushing the game has created a boatload of chances for the Lady Bulldogs.

Campbell thought his short roster contributed to the Trojans' 10 of 38 shooting.

"As soon as you get fatigued a little, your performance goes down," he said. "Stephanie (Boyle) didn't have a basket. But she took the ball to the basket and got fouled and she hit the free throws. You've got to do what you can. If you keep throwing the ball around (the perimeter) eventually you'll lose it. Hopefully in a game like this, they lose it before you do. We've got to play them again. Maybe three times counting the sectional.

	Coach Tom May (25 years -390-137) Assistant coaches: Beth Jacobs JV coach: Scott Reid   -  Freshman coach: Brian McClanahan 8th grade coach: Mike Malaski    -     7th grade coach: Angie Babjak
	2003-2004 Schedule
	Start times are JV starting times
Date	Location ALL CAPS = Duneland Athletic Conference game	Time/Result
Nov. 14	at Hebron (2-2)	W, 66-38
Nov. 15	at Kankakee Valley (1-1)	W, 62-31
Nov. 21	PORTAGE (2-3)	W, 52-39
Nov. 22	at Warsaw (2-1)	L, 47-62
Nov. 28	at CHESTERTON (3-0)	L, 27-36
Dec.  2	at Lowell	6:00 pm
Dec.  5	LaPORTE	6:00 pm
Dec. 12	at LAKE CENTRAL	6:00 pm
Dec. 13	Boone Grove	6:00 pm
Dec. 16	at VALPARAISO	6:00 pm
Dec. 19	MICHIGAN CITY	6:00 pm
Jan.  2	MERRILLVILLE	6:00 pm
Jan.  3	Hanover Central	6:00 pm
Jan.  7	at PORTAGE	6:00 pm
Jan. 10	CHESTERTON	6:00 pm
Jan. 16	LAKE CENTRAL	6:00 pm
Jan. 23	at MICHIGAN CITY	6:00 pm
Jan. 27	at LaPORTE	6:00 pm
Jan. 30	VALPARAISO	6:00 pm
Feb.  6	at MERRILLVILLE	6:00 pm
	CROWN POINT (4A) Sectional
2-10-4 (Tu)	Quarterfinals	6 or 8 p.m.
2-13-4 (F)	Semifinals	6 or 8 p.m.
2-14-4 (S)	Championship	7:30 p.m.
	Valparaiso (4A) Regional
2-21-4 (S)	Semifinals	11 a.m.
2-21-4 (S)	Championship	7 p.m.
	Plymouth (4A) Semistate
2-28-4 (S)	Semistate championship	(TBA)

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Revised: July 10, 2004 .