The Bellwood-Antis girls basketball team couldn’t help themselves against a tough Southern Huntingdon squad at Bellwood on Thursday night. The lady Rockets showed their athleticism in limiting Bellwood-Antis to just one shot on most occasions down the court and had little trouble breaking Bellwood’s press in a 67-51 Southern Huntingdon victory.
The Lady Blue Devils broke out in front on a Lauren Carter rebound and putback to start the scoring and Steph Hatch added a bucket to keep the Lady Blue Devils up 4-1.
Southern scored six points in a row however, until Hatch put in a free throw to stop the run with the lady Rockets ahead 7-5. Jenna Ralston popped in a basket from the side and Hatch and Lindsey Claar scored a field goal each to knot the score at 11-11. Southern Huntingdon scored the last five points of the quarter to take a 16-11 advantage into the second period.
“Southern does a good job boxing out,” said Bellwood-Antis coach Nick Lovrich in answer to why Bellwood-Antis seemed often to get only one shot, while Southern Huntingdon typically got several every time down the court. “Coach Beck works them long and hard They are really very fundamentally sound. If you watch them, they box out well, on their are press breaker, they did the little things, made the sharp passes, and got to be where they were supposed to be. That made it easy for them to break the press.”
A Ralston basket began the quarter, but by the time Bellwood-Antis scored again, on a bucket by Allison Sinisi, the Blue Devils trailed 24-15.
Ralston hit twice more from short range, including a steal and coast-to-coast drive and layup for the final score of the opening half, but the Lady Blue Devils trailed 28-19 at the intermission.
Hilary Shope knocked down a bucket for the Rockets to begin the third quarter, but Bellwood-Antis put on their best display of the night to close the deficit to 34-30. Jamie Smith began the barrage with a trey and Hatch, Carter, Sinisi and Ralston each contributed a bucket.
Southern Huntingdon went on a rampage of their own to keep the B-A girls at arms length, until Carter hit two straight fouls shots to close out the third quarter and two more to open the fourth quarter.
Jamie Smith tossed in another long trey and added a trio of free throws to try to get the Lady Blue Devils fired up, but everytime the Lady Blue Devils tried to get back in the game, Southern Huntingdon in general and Shope in particular had a answer. Shope would bring the Lady Rockets back to a secure lead, everytime B-A tried to cut into the margin.
“She (Shope) is a primetime player,” assessed Lovrich. “She is a three-year starter who has done pretty much everything. She made some big baskets there, she made her foul shots. That’s what you want from your players, she’s one of the best players in the league.”
Shope hit for 13 of her game-high 25 points in the fourth quarter to lead her teammates to a 25-17 scoring advantage in the quarter and leave Bellwood-Antis in the lurch. Shope tossed in a pair of baskets and Lacey Snyder added six points on a trey, basket and foul shot to push the Lady Rockets out to their biggest lead of the game, 66-46.
Hatch drilled the second of two three-pointers and Carter added two more on her team-high 14 points, to narrow the score the Lady Rocket lead to 15, but Southern emerged the victor.
“I think a highlight for us was us fighting to get back into the game,” explained Lovrich. “The kids never gave up, even at the end with 20 seconds to go, they were trying to steal the ball and score more points. The heart and desire is there in the kids. We just have to put a full game together, we have to make sure we take care of the basketball in our next game. With our desire, that will make us a better team.”
Bellwood-Antis (6-7) which lost a Juniata Valley League first cycle game at Southern Huntingdon 71-49, will play at Juniata Valley on Saturday in a makeup game which was postponed from the first week of Jan. Junior Varsity action will begin at 6 p.m. and the varsity game will start at 7:30.
The Lady Blue Devil junior varsity dropped a 42-9 decision to Southern Huntingdon.
Kerstin Myers was high scorer for B-A with four points and Chelsea Young added three points. Shalee Hunter pulled down eight rebounds and Myers had five.
Cate Gilliland led the Southern jayvees with eight points and Renee Schmidt and Alicia Hockenberry each had six points.
Southern Huntingdon 67 Bellwood-Antis 51
Southern Huntingdon – Shope 9 6-9 25, Clark 2 0-0 6, Kern 3 1-2 9, Wible 1 2-2 4, Woodward 2 0-0 4, Houck 1 0-0 2, Snyder 3 2-3 10, Hershey 2 2-2 7. TOTALS 23 13-18 67.
Bellwood-Antis – Hatch 3 1-2 9, Ralston 4 0-0 8, Sinisi 3 0-0 6, Carter 5 4-4 14, Smith 2 3-4 9, Claar 2 1-2 5. TOTALS 19 9-12 51.
Score by Quarters
Southern Huntingdon 16 12 14 25 – 67
Bellwood-Antis 11 8 15 17 – 51
Three point goals: Southern Huntingdon 8 (Clark 2, Snyder 2, Kern 2, Shope 1, Hershey 1).
Bellwood-Antis 4 (Hatch 2, Smith 2).
