By: Joe Blystone
THE VILLAGE REPORTER
publisher@thevillagereporter.com
FAYETTE (December 28, 2023) – Basketball games during winter break are like Christmas morning…you aren’t exactly sure what you are going to get.
After a less than stellar first five minutes, Pettisville gave coach Jason Waldvogel exactly what he was expecting with a 15-0 run that broke open a tie game and sent the Blackbirds to a 47-22 win over Fayette.
Pettisville is now 5-5 on the year while Fayette dropped to 2-7.
“When the girls came back (after Christmas) we had a couple of good days of practice,” Waldvogel said. “We haven’t had a lot of days off but fighting illnesses and getting people back, we got into a flow a little bit.”
Amanda Grimm’s floater and her hand back pass for an Olivia Miller three-pointer gave the Birds an early 5-0 lead.
However, when they went stale offensively, Kelsie Storrs split four free throws and Kenadie Ramay tripled to bring Fayette even with 3:40 left in the first.
That’s when the Eagles got a heavy dose of Grace Crawford as the 5’7 senior ignited the big Blackbird scoring burst.
First, Crawford went 1/2 from the line, then muscled up a putback and finished the quarter with a roll to the iron for two more to make it 10-5 after eight minutes.
Pettisville then scored the first ten points of the second quarter as Madison Remington got a lay in, Grimm tripled from the top of the arc and hit a pull up jumper before Miller capped the salvo with a three-point play off an inbounds play.
The cold shooting Eagles could only muster up 5/8 from the foul line while Pettisville shot 87 percent from the field in the second.
Lily Wiemken added to the Pettisville lead, using her strength to power in two more buckets in tight to increase the Blackbird lead to 28-10 at half.
Back-to-back stick backs by Ramay and Zoie Brown got the Eagles within 30-15 with 6:15 left in the third but that was as close as Fayette could get the rest of the way.
Kelsey Bennett was the beneficiary of two Wiemken inside-outside passes to bury a long triple and a jumper from the middle of the key to open up a 20 point lead by the end of the third as the Blackbirds coasted in from that time.
Pettisville shot 16/34 for the night, including a smoking 68 percent in the middle two quarters.
“Part of that comes from talking about separation on the floor and getting good possessions,” Waldvogel explained of the Birds hot shooting in the second and third.
“Starting late in the first and through the next two quarters we were pretty good with that and got open looks.”
Fayette was just 5/35 from the floor. Miller was the only player to reach double figures with 15.
PETTISVILLE (47) – Klopfenstein 2; Hastings 0; Bennett 6; Grimm 7; G. Remington 0; Fox 0; M. Remington 4; Miller 15; Crawford 7; Wiemken 6; Totals: 13-3-12 – 47
FAYETTE (22) – D. Storrs 0; Mitchell 0; K. Storrs 6; Powers 4; Gorsuch 0; Fetterman 9; Brown 3; Ramay 7; Schang 2; Totals: 4-1-11 – 22
PETTISVILLE 10 18 12 7 – 47
FAYETTE 5 5 10 2 – 22
JUNIOR VARSITY: Pettisville, 23-11
GAME STATISTICS
PETTISVILLE: FG – 16/34 (47%); FT – 12/19 (63%); Rebounds – 25; Turnovers – 16; FAYETTE: FG – 5/35 (14%); FT – 11/26 (42%); Rebounds – 19; Turnovers – 22