by JOHN HOWLEY / sportingpumpkin.com
CHILLICOTHE — Circleville never trailed Saturday as the Tigers stayed unbeaten in taking down Athens 50-35 to advance to the district championship.
CHS (24-0), the No. 2 seed, set the tone early holding No. 7 Athens (19-5) scoreless in the first quarter and forcing seven turnovers.
“I thought we were absolutely relentless,” Circleville coach Brian Bigam said. “We had a good feel from the first time (a 62-37 win in December) some of the things they were going to try to do against us, and Faith and Isabelle at the top of that are kind of relentless.
“It’s kind of our calling card. It’s what we’ve been doing all year is playing pretty well defensively.”
Up 7-0 after the first quarter, the Tigers led 18-10 at halftime and 31-19 after three.
“We knew we had to be intense with our defense and take away their key players. And we did that – we held them to zero points in the first quarter and caused them a lot of turnovers,” Circleville sophomore Maddie Blakeman said. “In the second half, we got a little tired, but we found it again.”
With baskets from Faith Yancey, Ally Thornsley and a three from Gabby McConnell, Circleville was up 38-19 about 90 seconds into the fourth quarter.
That’s when Athens put together a little run. The Bulldogs hit two of three free throws, which Circleville answered by hitting one and then Athens scored the next 10 points to make the score 39-29.
McConnell took a pass from Isabelle Perini and put it in to end the Bulldogs’ run and then Circleville hit seven of eight free throws in the final minute, along with a bucket from Yancey, to close out the game.
During that three-minute stretch where Athens was making its run, Bigam let the game play out – part of it was game management and part was the faith he had in his players to right the ship.
“I had two timeouts, and I was trying to keep an eye on the clock more for the end of the game and with Maddie, Gabby and Faith, you’ve got to have some trust that those three are going to do what they need to do,” Bigam said. “Those are my three leaders and it’s not like it’s the first time we’ve seen pressure. You’ve just got to count on them to do their job. We finally settled in and finally Gabby got a basket.
“Once we got that, we could take a breath and reset our mind.”
Blakeman was the game’s top scorer with 19 points with Yancey adding 13 and McConnell 10.
McConnell grabbed nine rebounds and Blakeman had seven as Circleville held a 27-17 rebounding edge.
Brystol Stump led Athens with 12 points.
The Tigers also got a lift from the stands as freshman Addison Edgington came to cheer on her teammates for the first time since being seriously injured in a car accident on Jan. 26.
“That’s pretty amazing. It was just a couple weeks ago she was in her car accident, and we didn’t know what was going to happen,” Blakeman said. “Just to see her sitting up there getting to watch us – I know she doesn’t get to play but at least she gets to come and support us and we just love Addison and miss her.”
“It’s great seeing her – one – but to see how hard she’s working already, starting therapy and walking in this gym – I think the girls understand that she’s busting her butt to get back to being healthy and we owe it to her to bust our butts and put the best product we can on the floor as possible,” Bigam said.
Circleville returns to Southeastern High School Wednesday to take on 3-seed Sheridan for a district title at 8:15 p.m.
Circleville finished the regular season ranked No. 4 in the final Associated Press poll for Division II with Sheridan (24-0) ranked No. 3. The other district championship game, being played at 6:15 that night has No. 1 seed Fairland (23-1) — ranked No. 2 in the final AP poll — taking on No. 4 seed Unioto (21-3) — which was ranked in the top 10 most of the season.
“This is district is unbelievable — it’s an absolute gauntlet. We just played Athens, a seven seed with 19 wins,” Bigam said.
Circleville 50, Athens 35
Athens — Ella Chapman 1-0-2, Quinn Banks 2-3-8, Olivia Smart 2-2-7, Brystol Stump 5-0-12, Asa Holcombe 2-2-6. Three-point goals — Banks, Smart, Stump (2). Total — 12-37 7-10 35.
Circleville — Faith Yancey 5-2-13, Maddie Blakeman 7-4-19, Isabelle Perini 1-0-3, Ally Thornsley 1-3-5, Gabby McConnell 4-0-10. Three-point goals — Yancey, Blakeman, Perini, McConnell (2). Total — 18-33 9-12 50.
Quarter scores 1 2 3 4 F
Athens 0 10 9 16 35
Circleville 7 11 13 19 50
