Poulos hits late 3-pointer to lead Lady Bulldogs to 37-34 win over Chesterton

A USA-365.com Special Report By Mark Smith
1-7-2006

Friday, 1-6-2006  girls basketball at Crown Point, IN - double header game #1

CHESTERTON (34)  Molly Rau 3-1-9, Rachel Hargarten 3-1-8, Kelly Peller 3-4-10, Maddie Wilk 2-0-5, Katrina Prazidad 1-0-2, Abby Skube 0-0-0, Katie Stahura 0-0-0.  TOTALS: 12 (6-12) 34.

CROWN POINT (37)  Hannah Plumley 2-0-4, Jackie Clements 1-0-2, Amanda Moore 2-0-5, Anjellica Rospond 1-0-2, Courtney Perry 2-5-9, Stephanie Poulos 5-1-15, Michelle Lipton 0-0-0, Ashley Zaucha 0-0-0, Melissa Spisak 0-0-0.  TOTALS: 13 (6-12) 37.

FREE THROWS:  Chesterton (6-12, 50%)  Rau 1-2, Hargarten 1-2, Peller 4-6;  CROWN POINT (6-12, 50%) Poulos 1-4, Perry 5-8.

REBOUNDS:  Chesterton (26) Peller 9, Rau 8, Prazidad 3, Skube 3, Hargarten 2, Wilk;  CROWN POINT (34) Perry 8, Poulos 7, Clements 5, Plumley 5, Moore 3, Rospond 3, Lipton 2, Spisak.

STEALS:  Chesterton (11) Skube 4, Rau 4, Peller 2, Wilk;  CROWN POINT (7) Plumley 3, Clemens 2, Perry, Spisak.

3-GOALS:  Chesterton (4) Molly Rau 2, Rachel Hargarten, Maddie Wilk.
CROWN POINT (5)  Stephanie Poulos 4, Amanda Moore.

FOULED OUT:  None

Thursday, 1-5-2006  girls basketball at Portage, IN

CROWN POINT (50)  Hannah Plumley 2-3-7, Jackie Clements 4-0-8, Amanda Moore 3-2-8, Anjellica Rospond 1-0-2, Courtney Perry 6-0-12, Stephanie Poulos 6-0-13, Michelle Lipton 0-0-0, Ashley Zaucha 0-0-0, Melissa Spisak 0-0-0.  TOTALS: 22 (5-7) 50.

PORTAGE (25) Brittney Buzea 0-2-2, Kacey Komacki 3-0-6, Gloria Hernandez 6-1-13,  Ashley Thompson 1-0-2, Hannah Major 0-1-1, Tiffany Keil 0-1-1, Felicia Williamson 0-0-0.  TOTALS:  10 (5-17) 25.

FREE THROWS:  PORTAGE (5-17, 29.3%) Buzea 2-4, Hernandez 1-7, Major 1-2, Keil 1-4.  CROWN POINT (5-7, 71.4%) Plumley 3-3, Moore 2-2, Rospond 0-2.       

3-GOALS:  PORTAGE (0) CROWN POINT (1) Stephanie Poulos.

FOULED OUT:  None.

Friday, 1-6-2006  boys basketball at Crown Point, IN - double header game #2

CHESTERTON (48)  AJ Jones 1-2-4, Curt Bradford 6-0-14, Zack Novak 5-4-15, Adam Nallenweg 1-1-3, Adam Hutnick 3-0-7, Mark Babcock 1-2-5, Jack Haupt 0-0-0, Chase Saylor 0-0-0, Alex Mennen 0-0-0.  TOTALS: 17 (9-10) 48.

CROWN POINT (51)  Danny Bouchee  4-1-10, Stephen Albrecht 4-4-12, Zach Cecich 4-4-12,   Aleks Alavanja 3-0-6, Ben Derks 0-2-2, Keith Dean 0-6-6, Kyle Hanaway 0-1-1, Nick Zolfo 0-0-0, Michael Kvachkoff 0-0-0, Andy Krumwied 0-0-0.  TOTALS: 15 (18-25, 72%) 51.

FREE THROWS:  Chesterton (9-10, 90%)  Jones 2-2, Novak 4-5, Nallenweg 1-1, Babcock 2-2.
CROWN POINT (18-25, 72%) Bouchee 1-2, Derks 2-2, Albrecht 4-6, Alvanja 0-1, Cecich 4-6, Dean 6-6,
Hanaway 1-2.

3-GOALS:  Chesterton (5) Curt Bradford 2, Zack Novak, Adam Hutnick, Mark Babcock.
CROWN POINT (3)  Stephen Albrecht 2, Danny Bouchee.

FOULED OUT:  Curt Bradford (C) 4th Q - :04 left.      (Click Here for the full CP Boys basketball story.)

CROWN POINT (1-6-2006) - Sometimes, when athletic teams play regular season games, the victor in the second game claims that his team obviously has shown improvement.  Friday's Crown Point-Chesterton girls basketball game was not one of those times.

"We both play the same way," said Chesterton coach Jack Campbell.  "We put a lot of pressure on each other defensively.  You just have to make plays.  They made a couple more than we did this time.  We got a lot of shots.  We just couldn't make them."

Maybe CP coach Tom May would be a tad more pleased since Stephanie Poulos hit a three-point shot with 10 seconds left to break a 34-34 tie?  Maybe not.

"Coach (Jack) Campbell, Coach (Chesterton assistant coach Fred) Mitchell Coach (CP assistant coach Scott) Reid, and Coach May will all tell you the same thing," said CP's Tom May after his side reversed an equally ugly 40-39 loss at Chesterton in November.

"That performance that you just witnessed set girls basketball back 30 years to 1976 when you had two-hand set shots and not much else.  I was very disappointed in how we played.  We never go in thinking about a win.  We want to play well and perform well and we didn't.  We had a very poor game."

What about the winning shot?  What about it?

"Why are you taking a three-point shot with 12 seconds left when you have the ball in a tie game and you have the ball waiting for a tie breaking shot?" asked a rhetorical coach May.  "The only way you can lose is if you miss and they go the other way and score. That's just an example of about how we didn't know what we were doing in the game.  We can't lose there.  We can get fouled.  We can get the last shot at three or four seconds.  That's what we wanted to do."

CP (10-5) was very lucky to win.  I have never seen a high school varsity team win a game when they went scoreless for an entire period.  Chesterton (9-5) turned a 14-9 deficit into a 19-14 halftime lead by holding CP without a point in the second period.  To be exact, CP did not score from the time when Anjellica Rospond tallied on an offensive rebound with 1:20 left in the first quarter until Courtney Perry hit two free throws with 6:09 left in the third quarter.  The gap between field goals was almost 16 minutes until Amanda Moore hit a jump shot with 2:03 left in the third period.

CP shot a dismal 6-of-28 in the first half and the luck was that Chesterton did not bury the home team under an insurmountable deficit during that time.

"I cant believe the fans are still here," May said he told his team at halftime.  "If I wasn't your coach, I wouldn't still be here.  There was no whole-ness tonight and everybody was afraid with the basketball.  Everybody was looking for someone else.  We made the same mistakes over and over by a multitude of different kids."

"They were concerned about Courtney Perry inside.  We finally made enough passes to get the ball to Perry inside.  And Stephanie Poulos and Amanda Moore decided they were going to shoot the ball."

Chesterton star Kelly Peller, who will play at Valparaiso University, faced double team pressure most of the night and her teammates could not make CP pay.  Molly Rau and Maddie Wilk missed and later began to pass up wing shots that should have won the game for Chesterton.  

"We did an OK job," said May. "But they had open shots.  They (Chesterton) had open looks.  They just missed a lot of them."

The Trojans were ahead 31-25  before Poulos, a 5-8 wing player, hit a three-point shot with 3:20 to go.  After an exchange of failed possessions, CP's Hannah Plumley fired a fast break pass to Moore, who scored to cut the lead to one.  The Trojans beat CP back down the floor and Rau, a 5-9 forward scored an easy layup to make it 33-30.

A jump shot by Poulos cut the lead to 33-32 with 1:20 to play and the Trojans wanted to hold the ball.  But Molly Rau missed a short shot inside 10 feet.  There were two problems with that.

"It wasn't a layup, was it?" noted Chesterton coach Jack Campbell.  "We wanted a layup.  We were ahead by a point.  At any other time of the game, that's a good shot."

Poulos fed Perry for a layup and a 34-33 CP lead with 35 seconds left, but Rau was fouled with 19 seconds to go.  Rau made the first, but she missed the second of two free throws, leaving game tied.  Without a time out, CP brought the ball up the floor and Poulos fired in a 20-foot shot just to the right of the free throw circle.  Peller got away an off-balance 30-footer that hit the back of the rim as time ran out.

"We told Stephanie, 'Good shot,'" said May. "Bad time management.  But nobody else was doing anything else to set up a shot."

CP-CHESTERTON NOTES:  "Chesterton is known for cover," said May. "Fred Mitchell (who handles Chesterton's defenses) does a terrific job defensively.  They sent four kids to our two kids with the ball.  We kept asking our kids to come up into the seams, get the ball and we'd have layups at the other end.  We didn't do that.  We made no attacking dribbles.  All of our dribbles were towards the sidelines. That's a bad sign."

Chesterton got good play off the bench from six foot freshman Abby Skube, who had three rebounds, a blocked shot and four steals.  But Katie Stahura was the only other Trojan sub and she played briefly.  That was a factor in CP's win.

"If there was any small difference in the game at all," said May.  "They went basically with six players and we used nine.  They were more tired than us at the end.  They had open looks that they missed.  They were a little slow covering us at the end."

Crown Point and Chesterton have played seven times in the last 2 1/2 seasons. In four of the games, both teams scored 40 points or less. All Duneland Athletic Conference (DAC) teams meet too much in the double round-robin scenario.  Odds are there will be an eighth CP-Chesterton game at next month's Valparaiso sectional.

"Oh, I can't wait for that one," Chesterton coach Jack Campbell said, as he rolled his eyes.