by JOHN HOWLEY /sportingpumpkin.com
Teays Valley was in control from the tip as it opened its league schedule with a 58-13 win over Logan Elm Saturday.
The Vikings forced an inexperienced Braves squad into 11 first period turnovers — converting a handful of those into 10 points — on the way to a 28-0 lead. Jenna Horsley had eight points in the quarter and Kennedy Younkin had seven.
TV was up 44-5 at the half.
While the Vikings didn’t shoot particularly well in the first half (17-40 from the field), they gave themselves plenty of second chances as they grabbed 16 offensive rebounds.
New to Ohio high school and junior high basketball this year, any time in the second half when a team has a 35-point advantage, a running clock will be used in the game until such time the margin is cut below 30. As the Vikings were up by 39 at the break, the new rule was used Saturday.
The teams played even in the third quarter with TV maintaining its margin with a 52-13 lead and the Vikings added six in the fourth.
For the Braves, every game is a learning process with only nine players on the varsity roster and no JV team.
“Our goal is to get better every time we come out, and our second half was much better than our first half once they calmed down little bit. That’s all we can really ask for is to keep getting better every time we hit the floor,” coach Jennifer Blue said.
The Vikings were able to use their pressure to disrupt LE’s passing lanes on the way to forcing 22 turnovers in the first half.
“Its one thing we’ve stressed in practice, is we call them lob passes and how lazy those are. With only having nine, it’s hard for us to even go up and down the court to demonstrate that to the girls. So it was nice for us to be able to say, ‘See, we told you these don’t work.’ It’s stuff like that that we can’t do with nine that was able to help us,” Blue said. “We were able to work on our press breaker, even though it wasn’t pretty. But we can now go watch film and show them where the gaps are and things like that.”
Led by Younkin with seven and McKenna Kautz and Aimee Watson with six each, Teays valley out rebounded the Braves 41-14. Of those, 26 were offensive rebounds.
“We’ve shown them in a couple of films in the past where they’re completely out of position to get a rebound. When you have someone as good as Younkin in there battling for it, you’ve got to get a butt in her and get her out and not try to jump with her,” Blue said. “We’ll take this back and break it down Monday and try to get some stuff out of it before we go to (Chillicothe) Tuesday.”
Up next
Teays Valley (2-0, 1-0) hosts Bishop Watterson Monday night while the Braves (0-2, 0-1) travel to Chillicothe Tuesday.
Teays Valley 58, Logan Elm 13
Teays Valley — McKenna Kautz 2-1-5, Aimee Watson 2-0-4, Jenna Horsley 3-0-8, Aly Williard 3-2-8, Ashley DeWeese 1-0-2, Kennedy Younkin 5-4-14, Ryleigh McCoy 3-0-7, Alyssa Horsley 3-0-7, Gabrielle Watkins 1-1-3. Three-point goals — Jenna Horsley (2), McCoy, Alyssa Horsley. Total — 23-50 8-17 58.
Logan Elm — Clara Wilson 1-0-2, Maggie Wilson 3-1-7, Cadence Haupt 2-0-4. Total — 6-20 1-5 13,
Quarter scores 1 2 3 4 F
Teays Valley 28 16 8 6 58
Logan Elm 0 5 8 0 13
