Lady Wildcats fall to Knox in 3A Title Game, 59-45

A USA-365.com Special Report by Mark Smith
02-15-2012

KNOX (59) Hope Wagner 7-3-19, Kara Howard 2-1-5, Kaitlin Zachary 6-0-12, Shelby Gilbert 4-3-15, Chelsea Combs 0-2-2, Rebecca Frasure 1-0-3, Sarah Coad 1-0-3, Taryn Brown 0-0-0, Miranda Shepherd 0-0-0, Rachel Lenig 0-0-0. TOTALS: 21 (9-12) 59

HANOVER (45) Katie Dominguez 2-0-6, Tiphani Ward 2-0-6, Kristn Roper 2-0-4, Blayr Postn 7-5-24, Emily Blue 1-0-3, Franke Turturillo 1-0-2, Danielle Schwalm 0-0-0, Summer Pattison 0-0-0, Hannah Blue 0-0-0, Taylor Hurst 0-0-0, Kaylin Fanta 0-0-0, Nikki Hahn 0-0-0.
TOTALS: 15 (5-9) 45

FREE THROWS: KNOX (10-14, 71.4%) Wagner 3-4, Howard 2-3, Gilbert 3-5, Combs 2-2; HANOVER (5-9, 55.5%) Poston 5-7, Roper 0-2.

REBOUNDS: KNOX (22) Zachary 12, Howard 4, Wagner 3, Gilbert 2, Combs; HANOVER (20) Poston 4, Roper 4, Ward 4, Dominguez 3 Emily Blue 2, Turturillo, Schwalm 2.

ASSISTS: KNOX (11) Combs 5, Wagner 4, Gilbert, Coad; HANOVER (6) Poston 4, Ward, Domnguez.

3-GOALS: KNOX (9) Shelbry Gilbert 4, Hope Wagner 2, Rebecca Frasure, Sarah Coad; HANOVER (10) Blayr Poston 5, Katie Dominguez 2, Tiphani Ward 2, Emily Blue.

FOULED OUT: HANOVER (1) Blayr Poston (4th Q) 1:06 left.

"We shot the ball awfully well," said Knox coach Dan Huizenga, who saw his school win its first girls basketball sectional since 1995.

"After starting 2-10, I couldn't be happier," he said. "The girls worked their butts off in practice. We thought we'd be capable of puling this off. After losing last year (53-35 to Griffith in the sectional title game), the three seniors came to me and said there's no way they're losing the sectional next year."

"As a coach that's what you want to hear, but you don't want to set yourself up for a let down. But everything the girls did in the off season finally paid off tonight."

Knox senior guards Shelby Gilbert and Hope Wagner, who have played together all the way through youth leagues, combined for 19 first half points as the Redskins took a narrow first half lead early and maintained it.

"They had multiple people who can handle the ball," said HC coach Doug Nelson, "and we had one. We need five kids who can run the floor and handle the ball like they do."

Hanover, with just two seniors in Emily Blue and Katie Dominguez, just didn't have enough at either end of the floor to pull off what would have been an upset sectional triumph.
In a 7 p.m. Monday night game, Knox scored on enough back door plays against the HC set defense to open up space for long range jump shots in a solid offensive display. Hanover could not match up with 6-foot junior Kaitlin Zachary, who had 12 points and 12 rebounds against an HC front line with started no one taller than 5-foot-9.

This was a strange game. In college basketball, all teams throw up 30 three-point shots a night. But in real basketball, you can't rely on distance shooting in the post-season against good teams on neutral sites. If you had told me that Hanover would hit 10 three-point baskets in the sectional championship game, I'd have told you to make room for the championship trophy. But in reality, HC never led after the first quarter. Blayr Poston, HC's 5-foot-7 guard and the Porter County Conference scoring champion, put up 13 points in the first half and Dominguez added two three-point shots in an unsually offensive playoff game. Neither side led by more than three points until an 8-2 run gave the Starke County girls a 33-26 halftime lead.

"All our 3s seemed to be in response to theirs," said Nelson. "It was a four point game starting the fourth quarter. But we played every possession in the fourth quarter like there was 30 seconds left in the game. We just needed to slow down. See what they give you. You just have to go to the basket and be strong. I think that comes with improved skills."

Knox didn't have any more success guarding the 3-point line than Hanover did. The number of successful three-point shots by both teams was almost shocking.

"We got enough stops late in the third quarter and early in the fourth quarter," said Huizenga, "to get away with it. When we shoot the way we did tonight, we're tough to guard."

Poston scored the first five points of the second half and 5-foot junior Tiphani Ward added two three-point shots to keep Hanover with 39-37 in the final minute of the third quarter. But HC seemed to tire at this point and the Redskins scored six in a row for a 45-37 lead in front of a crowd of about 500 in the double decked 3,500-seat KV gymnasium.

After three quarters, the two teams had combined for 17 three-point goals. But as that pace finally slowed in the late going, Knox forced Hanover to chase and foul them, making 8-of-10 free shots in the late. Poston scored over 50% of HC's points. HC needs someone else who can create their own shot.

"We knew we had to play four guards," said coach Doug Nelson, "so we had to go with four guards to match up with them."

"We're kinda young," he said. "We only have two seniors. They weren't big scorers, but they were leaders for us in the locker room and the weight room. Blayr gets better as she gets older but we need some better weapons around her. It might seem like we set everything up for her, but the times we set some thing up for someone else, they can't finish. We can't make shots in the paint."

Hanover did very well with the size and ball-handling limitations they had. HC's center is 5-foot-7 sophomore Kristin Roper and their only other ball-handler was freshman guard Frankie Turturillo, who came off the bench. The question wasn't so much how did they lose to Knox in the final, but how did they defeat Kankakee Valley in the Saturday semifinals, which were postponed from Friday due to a snowstorm. Hanover lost four of the last five games in the regular season including two demoralizing losses to PCC champion Boone Grove (19-2).

"We had one person in double figures," said Nelson, who accepted the outcome calmly. "They had three. They did a good job of running their offense. Setting their stuff up. We didn't do much about it. We had a great year. We need to be able to score in the paint and we need another guard who can get her own shot."

SECTIONAL NOTES: This was the fifth year in a row that Hanover has played in the girls basketball sectional championship game. The Lady Cats missed sophomore guard Rylie Singleton, who missed the final four games with what turned out to be a torn ACL.

"She would have made a couple of threes tonight," said HC coach Doug Nelson, who said that Singleton is scheduled for surgery next month. "Maybe she'd have been able to guard some of their shooters."

The small (30 or 40 kid) Knox student cheering section was for some reason place directly behind the Hanover Central bench, making the evening miserable for the Lady Cats. Hanover had a slightly smaller student cheering group, but it was positioned across the floor from both benches.

HC's Blayr Poston went over the 1,000-point mark in the sectional with 28 in the 47-42 semifinal upset of Kankakee Valley and 24 against Knox. Poston is on line to break the school's all-time scoring mark set by Melanie Brumbaugh 12 years ago some time next season.

Knox senior Shelby Gilbert was said to have played all year with ligament damage in both hands but she seemed to feel no pain Monday, scoring 16 including four three point shots. The title game was played Monday night because snow kept Hanover from getting to KV for Friday's semifinals. HC's semifinal against KV was moved to Saturday night.

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Revised: February 17, 2012 .