By: Joe Blystone
THE VILLAGE REPORTER
publisher@thevillagereporter.com
FAYETTE (January 22, 2024) – On a night when you don’t shoot the ball well, and Hilltop didn’t going 10/41, or handle it well, the Cadets had 25 turnovers, if you can defend? Well, the end result you will probably still like.
Despite those offensive deficiencies, Hilltop held Fayette to just five second half points, including a goose egg in the fourth quarter to put up a 39-17 victory over the Eagles.
“Defensively we played pretty well,” Cadet leader Troy Grime said. “They did a great job against the press, but we tweaked it a bit at halftime, and it seemed to help us turn them over and slow them down a little bit.”
Libbie Baker scored three first quarter buckets and Kenley Routt converted a three-point play to boost the Cadets ahead 12-5.
Baker’s two free tosses at the 5:28 mark of the second increased the Hilltop margin to 14-5 but Fayette bounced back.
Addison Shang scored off a turnover, then fed Zoie Brown down low twice when she broke the press to get Fayette back to 14-12.
The Cadets missed all 11 of their second quarter field goal attempts but used 6/6 from the stripe by Baker to take an 18-12 lead into the locker room.
“In the first half (Fayette) was getting by us and got a couple easy buckets down there,” Grime explained of the Eagles second quarter run.
“When you press, you’ll give up easy buckets once in a while. You just want to turn them over more than you give up those easy ones. I thought we were much better in the second half.”
Kelsie Storrs’ triple from the top of the key with 6:18 to go in the third brought Fayette to a one score game but it took the Eagles over four minutes to dent the scoreboard again.
In the meantime, Baker scored inside then found Molly Dickinson and Brynn Rodriguez for layups to pump up the Hilltop (10-4, 3-0 BBC) lead to 26-15.
Baker’s third chance putback and a Rodriguez triple made it 33-17 going into the fourth.
For the night Baker had 21 points, 16 rebounds and nine blocked shots. Rodriguez chipped in with 10 more.
Brown topped the Eagle scoring with nine as Fayette (2-11, 0-3 BBC) went 7/39 from the field with 23 turnovers.
HILLTOP (39) – Dickinson 2; Rodriguez 10; Routt 3; Baker 21; VanArsdalen 0; Bailey 1; Connolly 1; Crossgrove 1; Totals: 9-1-18 – 39
FAYETTE (17) – Sinks 1; D. Storrs 0; Mitchell 0; K. Storrs 3; Powers 2; Gorsuch 0; Fetterman 0; Brown 9; Ramay 0; Schang 2; Totals: 6-1-2 -17
HILLTOP 12 6 15 6 – 39
FAYETTE 5 7 5 0 – 17