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By Steve Carpenter
HCC Sports Information Director
Friday, November 14, 2008
Freshman Ariella McGhee and
Naudia Campbell both had double-doubles for the second-straight game to lead
the Hutchinson Community College women’s basketball team to a 74-55 victory
over Jayhawk East opponent Neosho County 74-55 on Friday night in the first
night of the Airport Steakhouse Classic at the Sports Arena.
Campbell had 21 points and
13 rebounds for the Lady Dragons. McGhee had 15 points, 13 rebounds three
blocked shots and four steals.
Hutchinson won the game on
the boards, outrebounding Neosho County 61-35. In addition to Campbell and
McGhee, freshman Heather Robben also reached double figures in rebounding
with 11. HCC had 21 offensive boards, converting those into 16 points.
Neosho was limited to five second-chance points.
“Our kids did a great job of
getting their man boxed out and just being aggressive and going to get
rebounds,” HCC head coach John Ontjes said. “Anytime a team takes long
shots, there’s going to be long rebounds and our kids did a good job.”
“We did really good boxing
out,” said McGhee, who last week tied a 22-year old record with 17 rebounds
in a game. “We’ve got to box out until we have the ball in our hands.”
The Lady Dragons (3-0) had
to withstand Neosho County’s 3-point barrage. The Panthers shot a staggering
41 3-pointers – the most ever against a Hutchinson team – hitting 11.
Neosho’s Kaitlyn Biehl did the most damage with six.
Neosho County (2-2), which
had only eight 2-point baskets in the game, was limited to 27.9 percent
shooting overall (19 of 68). The Panthers were 6 of 11 from the free-throw
line. They committed 26 turnovers.
“That was an all-out effort
by our team,” Ontjes said. “We really concentrated on keeping the basketball
in front of us, now allowing them to penetrate and get easy baskets and
limit them to one shot. The kids really played out the game plan
defensively.”
Biehl had 18 points to lead
Neosho County. Danielle Harris had 17 points and Fila Smith, who had a
triple-double against Pratt earlier this week, had 12 points.
The Lady Dragons had to
overcome 28 turnovers against a full-court pressing Panther team.
Still HCC shot 42.2 percent
overall (27 of 64), going only 1 of 12 from 3-point range. HCC was 19 of 32
from the free-throw line.
Robben finished with eight
points. Brittney Chamberlin had seven and Brittany Hines and Briyana Evans
had six each.
“I think we rebounded pretty
good,” Campbell said. “They had jus one girl 6 feet or taller so we took
advantage of that and attacked the boards offensively and defensively.”
In the first half, Neosho
County had nine baskets, eight were 3-pointers, which kept the game in
single figures for most of the half.
HCC led 7-3, but
back-to-back Biehl treys gave Neosho a 9-7 lead with 14:58 to play in the
half. Sasha King’s 3-pointer 13 seconds later gave Hutch the lead for good,
but it was slow build to finally reaching a comfortable margin.
With Hutch leading 26-22
with 6:09 to play, the Lady Dragon defense started to create turnovers and
easy chances, sparking a 10-0 run. McGhee had the final three buckets of the
run and HCC led 34-22 with 2:47 left in the half.
Campbell’s bucket from a
King inbound with 1 second to play gave HCC a 39-27 lead at halftime.
Leading 41-30 with 17:57 to
play in the second half, HCC went on another quick burst, this time a 9-0
run over a 2 minute, 17 second span. Campbell completed a three-point play
and then hot another inside hoop to give Hutch a 50-30 lead with 15:23 to
go.
Neosho County then went on a
14-4 run, holding HCC without a field goal for 4:22, and pulled within 10 at
54-44 on a Biehl 3-pointer. The lead was still 10 with 7:24 to play when HCC
went on a 7-0 run to build the lead back to 68-51 with 2:58 to play in the
game.
The Lady Dragons close out
the Airport Steakhouse Classic on Saturday night against Eastern Oklahoma
State.
GAME NOTES
– The Lady Dragons had 14 steals in the game. Ariella McGhee had four steals
and Briyana Evans had three steals. … Robben had her second game of 10 or
more rebounds in HCC’s first three games. … This was HCC’s 11th-straight
victory over Neosho County. Hutch is 13-1 all-time against the Panthers. …
HCC has had five double-doubles in the first three games. Last season, HCC
had five throughout the year. … HCC’s bench outscored Neosho County’s 22-2.
… The 19 free throws tie a season high for Hutchinson.
HCC-NEOSHO COUNTY BOXSCORE
CLOUD
COUNTY-EASTERN OKLAHOMA STATE BOXSCORE
PHOTO
GALLERY
OTHER QUOTES
Head coach John Ontjes
On how quickly Neosho
County could score …
“We knew that they could
score very quickly. I told the kids that they were going to have to
withstand a run in the second half. They did that. There’s not too many kids
on the floor who have been in late-game situations to be able to handle the
pressure and take care of the basketball. This is a team that will have some
growing pains and they will learn to finish games more efficiently.”
Freshman Naudia Campbell
On playing a fast team
like Neosho County …
“We did fairly good on
transition defense. We stopped the ball and got to our men quickly.”
On her and Ariella
McGhee’s double-doubles …
“I’m very excited about it.”
On the team working to
get better …
“The competition is going to
get harder and hard, so we have to keep working harder in practice to
accomplish the things that we need to do.” |
