Behind 27 points from Katlyn Mosley, the Westfield Lady Hornets
rolled into the 2013 portion of the current basketball season. Her total was
not quite half of the Westfield output, but it came against a major rival,
Deerfield-Windsor, who fell 59-35 in a non-region contest held Friday.
It was the first game back in the Westfield gym for former
Lady Hornet coach Jeff Eubanks, who now leads the Lady Knights from Albany.
Westfield’s team played under acting head coach Kyle Davis for Cass Cassell,
who had to be absent for family reasons.
Point guard Callie Hammerle scored 14 points and forward
Valerie McLure added nine as the Lady Hornets swept the non-region series from
Deerfield-Windsor. This is the first time in almost a decade that the two
rivals will not be battling each other for a region championship.
Even though Westfield’s margin of victory in Albany one
month ago was 29 points, it didn’t put the home team in the frame that the
rematch would be an easy contest. That was evident when the Lady Hornets
couldn’t make anything on numerous second-shot attempts and had just two points
halfway through the first quarter. The Lady Knights, though, had none in that
same span with steals made by McLure and Hammerle.
At 3:48, Hammerle penetrated the lane for a short jumper,
but the visitors answered with their first field goal seconds later due to a
misplay from Westfield defensively.
But what the Lady Hornets punished Deerfield-Windsor with
were the long outlets for open lay-ups. The first one went from forward Sydney
Ledford to Moseley. Hammerle also had no miscalculations when she made a steal
and score for 8-2.
From one sideline to another, McLure found reserve forward
Chelsea Whaley for another easy 2.
In the final minute of the quarter, the Lady Knights strung
together a pair of baskets, taking advantage of a turnover at the 38-second
mark. Plenty would happen later, McKinley Walton making a steal for passes
back-and-forth between Hammerle and McLure.
Deerfield-Windsor’s Nyla Perry, trying all quarter to ‘bust
it’ from outside at the urging of her coach Eubanks, finally did it at the
buzzer. She would do it again, but for this first one it made the score 12-8.
With the first possession of the second quarter, the Lady
Knights executed in the half court. Westfield would miss its first six shots,
turn the basketball over four times and see Ledford earn a second personal
foul. At 4:25, the game was tied 12-12.
Whaley scored the first Lady Hornet points at 3:40. McLure
added two steals with one assist, Moseley scored five points and Ledford
returned to the floor to get a steal and engage in more to-and-fro passing with
McLure on a break. In all, it was a 9-0 run as Walton added a foul-line jumper.
Perry repeated her first-quarter action to end the first
half, but this time the Westfield lead was eight, 23-15.
At 6:45 of the third quarter, Ledford had to sit with a
third foul. Deerfield-Windsor turned on its own running game, sprinting down
the floor twice on missed shots to close within four, 27-23.
McLure, though, came up with a fantastic transition block,
and when Moseley scored off a Hammerle steal, the Lady Hornets were able to get
the press going. Hammerle, in a one-pass possession, found a cutting McLure to
stretch out their run to six straight and a 10-point edge.
With a lob inside to Hammerle and a feed to a cutting
Moseley, McLure ended the period with two assists. That led to a 37-28
advantage. A strong start to the fourth was needed to put the Lady Knights
away, and Moseley sank a corner 3 and Walton fed Hammerle in transition for
42-29 at 6:30. Hammerle had two more steals, and McLure put back a miss from
the foul line.
BOYS ACTION
Jake Walls knew that, even when it was a region game,
playing Deerfield-Windsor gave his team a chance to see one of the best in all
of the GISA. The Knights made a strong case Friday about looking out for them
in late February when they cruised to the win 84-52.
Romello Carter of Deerfield-Windsor led all scorers with 18
points. Freshman Giles Amos, starting at center for the injured Wade Forrester,
led all Hornets with 15 points. Behind him was guard James Beeland and his 13
points.
Facing the full-court pressure, Westfield made Amos the
prime target under the offensive basket for any and all long passes.
Guard
Barrett Stanley beat that press with an early assist to Amos. The freshman had
another strong finishing move, but it wasn’t enough to counter the eight from
Carter and a swath of turnovers that put the Knights up 27-11 after one
quarter.
When D-W went up 33-15 on a Carter 3-pointer, Stanley used
patient dribbling to find another assist inside to Amos. That was part of the
best Hornet run, seven in a row, capped by a Beeland 3 (33-22).
Beeland also scored following in his own long miss. Sam
Shellhaus copied Perry’s act from the girls’ game by scoring three a second
before the buzzer. That put the Knights up 48-30 at the half.
Westfield was unable to keep Deerfield-Windsor off the
offensive boards in the third quarter, which ended at 77-42. Stanley and Amos
did partner one more time, Amos making a fine catch-and-shoot move to score.
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