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By Steve Carpenter
HCC Sports Information Director
Monday, February 2, 2009
LIBERAL – It was five years
ago this month that the Hutchinson Community College women’s basketball team
snapped Seward County’s 135-game home court winning streak. On Monday night,
the Lady Dragons earned another footnote in the history of defeating the
Saints at the Greenhouse.
Freshmen Heather Robben and
Ariella McGhee both had double-doubles to lead Hutchinson to a 66-64 victory
over No. 14 Seward County. It was only the sixth home loss for the Saints
since 1994, and the Lady Dragons are the only team to win twice in Liberal
during that span of time.
Monday’s victory over the
Saints secured a 20-win season for the Lady Dragons (20-3), the 19th 20-win
season in program history.
The win, along with Barton’s
win over Cloud County on Monday night, forced a four-way tie atop the
Jayhawk West. Hutch, Seward County, Barton and Cloud County are all tied at
7-2.
In a span of 54 hours, the
Lady Dragons earned two road victories against a pair of nationally ranked
opponents. HCC toppled No. 10 Cloud County 61-56 on Saturday in Concordia.
“It gives our kids so much
more confidence to go on the road and win at such tough places like Cloud
and Seward,” HCC head coach Jon Ontjes said. “These types of games help you
down the road in region play. They are physical. They are tight. Free throws
are important. Every possession you have to value the basketball.”
The Lady Dragons also
remained perfect on the road in Jayhawk West play with five-straight league
wins away from the Sports Arena. HCC is 7-1 on the road this season, tying
for the fifth-most wins on the road in a single season.
“We played as a team,” said
Robben, who had her second-straight double-double. “We weren’t playing like
we know how to play earlier this season. We have a lot of talent on this
team, but we weren’t using it all. We just played together and worked
together. We executed and played defense and we won.”
Hutchinson stunned Seward
County by jumping out to a 22-3 lead in the first half. But the Saints
battled back to pull within 36-27 at halftime. Hutch had leads as large as
14 in the second half, but Seward County started bombing away from the
outside, hitting seven second-half 3-pointers and led 57-54 with 4:49 to
play on a Rachel Barnes trey.
The Lady Dragons answered
with a 10-0 run to take a 64-57 lead with 2:01 to go and led 66-61 with 1:03
remaining. Seward had one more comeback attempt. La’Nell Taylor had two
3-point attempts on the final possession, but neither were close.
“We’ve been working hard at
practice,” McGhee said. “We had to pull these wins off because they were
important to get back into the race.”
Added Ontjes: “We never got
rattled. We continued to make plays when we needed to. Heather stepped up
and hit an important shot and Naudia (Campbell) had a big basket. We played
with some fear there to not allow them to get any looks on that last shot.”
Robben had her third
double-double of the season, finishing with 22 points, 12 rebounds and a
season high-tying four steals. McGhee had her ninth double-double with 14
points and 10 rebounds. Freshman Naudia Campbell had 11 points and seven
rebounds.
The Lady Dragons shot 23of
52 overall (44.2 percent) and was 4 of 11 from 3-point range and 16 of 24
from the free-throw line. The Lady Dragons outrebounded Seward County (19-4,
7-2), getting 13 offensive boards that turned into 16 HCC points. HCC won
despite turning the ball over a season-high 32 times.
Seward County was held to
35.6 percent shooting (21 of 59), including 8 of 32 from 3-point range and
14 of 26 from the free-throw line.
Megan Lassley had 16 points
to lead the Saints. Barnes finished with 14 points and had 13 rebounds.
Vannessa Simmons had 11 points.
Hutchinson got off to a
great start holding Seward County to one field goal in the first 10 1/2
minutes. Meanwhile, the Lady Dragons hit 12 of their first 19 field-goal
attempts and built a 22-3 lead after a Campbell field goal with 11:16 to
play. The lead was still 19 after a Calli Mathews jumper with 4:28 left in
the half gave Hutch a 32-13 lead, but Seward County closed the half on a
14-4 run and cut the Lady Dragon cushion to 36-27 at halftime after Simmons
buried a jumper at the buzzer.
HCC was able to maintain its
double-figure lead through most of the first 6 1/2 minutes of the second
half. Two Brittney Chamberlin free throws with 13:25 to go gave Hutch a
46-36 lead.
Seward County’s pressure
started to force multiple turnovers, while the Saints started to find their
range from behind the 3-point line. Barnes completed the Saints rally with
back-to-back 3-pointers, tying the game at 54-all with 5:16 to go and taking
the lead 27 seconds later with a long trey.
But HCC answered Seward’s
run with a 10-0 run over the next 2:32. With the game tied at 57-all, Robben
canned a 3-pointer with 3:30 to go to take the lead and a Campbell putback
with 2:01 to play gave Hutch a 64-57 lead.
Sparks’ two free throws with
1:03 to play gave Hutch a 66-61 lead, but Lassley drilled a 3-pointer with
50 seconds to go, and then the Lady Dragons had to withstand two 3-point
attempts in the final seconds to earn the victory.
The Lady Dragons play host
to Dodge City on Wednesday night at the Sports Arena. Tipoff is at 5:30 p.m.
GAME NOTES
– Robben is now eighth on the HCC freshman free-throw list with 81 makes. …
McGhee is now ninth on the HCC freshman rebounding list with 215. … Robben
had her fifth 20-point game of the season, which is the team’s 11th of
2008-09. The 2007-08 team had just four 20-point games. … HCC is 30-38
all-time against Seward County and is 12-20 in Liberal. … Seward County had
23 steals, the most against HCC this season. … Seward’s Barnes tied an
individual season high against HCC with 13 rebounds. … South Plains,
Labette, Barton County and Colby are the only other teams to defeat Seward
County at the Greenhouse since 1994.
BOXSCORE
OTHER QUOTES
Head Coach John Ontjes
On withstanding Seward
County’s rally …
“We just made enough plays.
We got off to a great start and the pace of the game was to our advantage.
We three-quarter court trapped them, which slowed them down and we zoned
them. They didn’t shoot as well as they did at the Sports Arena.”
On the Jayhawk West race
…
“We got back into the race
tonight. We can’t have any letdowns. This is an extremely tough week because
we still have to play on Wednesday and Saturday. We are going to have to
find some energy. We have to continue to build momentum”
Freshman Heather Robben
On withstanding Seward
County’s rally …
“We just needed to settle
down and take care of the ball. We needed to keep our composure and get a
shot. I was nervous. They kept making threes.”
On the 22-3 start to the
game …
“It was crazy. We played
defense and we got the ball inside. Everything was going our way and they
made a run. We knew they were going on that run. We just had to go on a run
on our own after that.”
Freshman Ariella McGhee
On winning games on the
road …
“I really don’t know. We
play hard on the road and we’ve gotten wins.”
On withstanding Seward
County’s rally …
It made us work harder. We
had to make plays and have less turnovers. |
