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Girls Basketball: Dundee-Crown downs Larkin for seventh win in a row
Updated: December 20, 2011 10:23PM
Dundee-Crown’s girls got off to their customary hot start from the three-point line Tuesday afternoon at Larkin.
However, the Chargers needed something more to gain separation en route to their seventh straight victory, 58-41. “We were committing too many turnovers,” coach Michelle Russell said. “And we needed to hit the boards harder and play defense.”
D-C did everything right in the second and third quarters to coast into their own 29th annual Charger Classic next week riding a high they haven’t seen since Joe Komaromy was coaching the team.
“We haven’t had a streak this long in the (four) years coach Russell has been here and it feels real good,” said Chargers guard Ali Sanders “When we started off 0-4 at our Thanksgiving tournament it wasn’t good, but we saw what our strengths and weaknesses were and we knew that this year was going to be different for us and we’d be able to get on a streak like this.”
D-C (7-4) got 23 points from Sanders and 14 inside from Diamond Williams, and started off the game hitting 5-of-6 from the three-point line in the first quarter.
However, Larkin (1-13) managed to stay close by hitting the boards for a 9-7 advantage and shooting 50 percent from the field in the first quarter (7-of-14).
The game changed in the second and third quarters when D-C stopped hitting as many threes, but held the Royals to 5-of-22 from the floor and outrebounded them 22-14.
“I think it was more us and the fact we were not taking care of the ball, not executing our offense,” Larkin coach Tissanie Simmons said. “We didn’t turn it up on defense then, either.”
The Royals also had trouble shooting, and were also missing one of their scoring leaders, Maggie Hofmann, who was away on vacation.
D-C got three three-pointers in three attempts midway through the first quarter — two from Sanders and one from Carlin Faulkner, who was making her first start since missing time with an ankle sprain. Faulkner finished with eight points.
The shots put D-C up 14-6 and an 8-0 run in the second quarter for a 32-17 lead left Larkin behind double figures the rest of the game. D-C hit only one more trey after the first quarter and led 47-28 after three quarters, but now moves on to its own court for one of the toughest fields for a holiday tournament in the state.
“We need to be more confident with the ball now,” Sanders said. “We need to lower our turnovers and take higher percentage shots and just play a lot harder because teams are going to be bigger, faster, stronger.”
Larkin got 12 points each from Jill Casebeer and Victoria Patterson, but had trouble stopping Williams on the boards as she came away with 13 rebounds.
“Our kids, they won’t give up even though we have lost a lot in a row,” Simmons said. “Definitely we continue to have courage regardless of our record.”
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