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GIRARD —
It was one thing to lose two games in a row, but to drop their final game at home? Well, the five Trojan seniors would not tolerate that.
Playing on Senior Night, the Girard girls fought off a resilient Oswego Indian squad 54-42 to improve their record to 13-5.
Seniors Paige Zimmerman, Jordan Ivey, Hope McLeod, Jenna Schroeder and Hadyn Herlocker scored a combined 33 out of Girard’s 54 points.
It was only poetic justice that a senior group who was part of two sub-state championship teams in the last three years would go out with a bang in their final regular season home game. For head coach Brad Herlocker, he couldn’t be more gratified.
“I’ve watched all five of these girls grow up and coached them,” Coach Herlocker said. “To watch them from a very young age to now is a very satisfying thing. I could not be more proud of them that they finished their last home game with a win.”
But the victory did not come as easy as they hoped. After jumping to a six-point lead in the first quarter, the Indians started up with Kaeylyn Yeoman getting a field goal to cap a 5-0 run. Yeoman hit a shot from the inside to end the first with a 11-all score.
Oswego then proceeded to go in front with another inside shot to start the second.
That all changed when the Trojans went on a 6-2 run and there was no looking back for Girard.
“I think we played pretty well. Oswego had four players that were as good as we all were,” Coach Herlocker said. “They had a post in there that really hurt us. They did a good job of getting positioned down low. Boxing out wasn’t quite there. We had two or three runs where we made a difference in the game with the full court press.”
Considering it was the second game in three days for the Trojans, it was not surprising that some players were feeling a bit worn out in the first half.
“I think it was a situation where I substituted 10 people in the game,” Coach Herlocker said. “When your legs start leaving you so do your fundamentals. I don’t think it was anything on their part except just fatigue.”
Hadyn Herlocker was the leading scorer for the Trojans, finishing with 15 points total. Hope McLeod had 14 and Carly Heatherly added nine.
It was one thing to lose two games in a row, but to drop their final game at home? Well, the five Trojan seniors would not tolerate that.
Playing on Senior Night, the Girard girls fought off a resilient Oswego Indian squad 54-42 to improve their record to 13-5.
Seniors Paige Zimmerman, Jordan Ivey, Hope McLeod, Jenna Schroeder and Hadyn Herlocker scored a combined 33 out of Girard’s 54 points.
It was only poetic justice that a senior group who was part of two sub-state championship teams in the last three years would go out with a bang in their final regular season home game. For head coach Brad Herlocker, he couldn’t be more gratified.
“I’ve watched all five of these girls grow up and coached them,” Coach Herlocker said. “To watch them from a very young age to now is a very satisfying thing. I could not be more proud of them that they finished their last home game with a win.”
But the victory did not come as easy as they hoped. After jumping to a six-point lead in the first quarter, the Indians started up with Kaeylyn Yeoman getting a field goal to cap a 5-0 run. Yeoman hit a shot from the inside to end the first with a 11-all score.
Oswego then proceeded to go in front with another inside shot to start the second.
That all changed when the Trojans went on a 6-2 run and there was no looking back for Girard.
“I think we played pretty well. Oswego had four players that were as good as we all were,” Coach Herlocker said. “They had a post in there that really hurt us. They did a good job of getting positioned down low. Boxing out wasn’t quite there. We had two or three runs where we made a difference in the game with the full court press.”
Considering it was the second game in three days for the Trojans, it was not surprising that some players were feeling a bit worn out in the first half.
“I think it was a situation where I substituted 10 people in the game,” Coach Herlocker said. “When your legs start leaving you so do your fundamentals. I don’t think it was anything on their part except just fatigue.”
Hadyn Herlocker was the leading scorer for the Trojans, finishing with 15 points total. Hope McLeod had 14 and Carly Heatherly added nine.
After going into halftime with a 25-19 lead, the Trojans tightened their grip with a 31-22 score and then a 36-30 advantage.
Johnson’s first field goal of the second half came in the fourth quarter as part of a 9-2 run to take a 49-34 lead into the closing minutes.
In the final minute, all five seniors went into the game to finish off the Indians for the last time.
There’s no time to rest for the Trojans. They will immediately turn their attention to the Southeast Lancers tonight for an unusual three games in one week schedule.
Obviously, staying fit will be the biggest challenge as it looks it’ll take a show of toughness from the Trojans to come out and play with intensity.
“While Southeast is at home with their legs up, we’ve been playing tonight,” Coach Herlocker said. “It’s going to be a real challenge and gut check. I have no doubt that the effort will be there. I don’t know about the legs but the effort will be there.”
Oswego boys 62, Girard 56
A late meltdown in the fourth quarter doomed the Girard Trojans (8-10) after such a promising first half to the Oswego Indians, 62-56.
After leading 40-35 in the third quarter and then a six-point lead in the fourth, the Trojans began to collapse, being outscored in the final eight minutes by 13 points and giving up the game.
“You got to give Oswego a lot of credit,” said Girard head coach Rod Wescott. “They competed the entire game but the big difference was the fourth quarter.”
It may have been Senior Night but junior Devin Alters was the leading scorer out of both teams, finishing with 20 points. Cody Grilz had 10 for Girard while Tag Oldham led the Indians with 15.
The Trojans played to a comfortable 11-3 lead in the first quarter. An alley-oop layup from Alters made it a seven-point game.
Suddenly, the Indians started to slowly creep up, building a 9-0 run before halftime and then went in front after a Brant Yeoman inside shot. Alters tied the game at 23 and that’s where both teams sat at the break.
With Alters and Grilz in double figures, it’s safe to say that scoring was not a huge problem for the Trojans but the biggest issue was too many errors by the defense.
“We weren’t very disciplined on the floor defensively, and we gambled too much,” Wescott said. “I thought we shot the ball well and did some good things on offense but in the fourth quarter, we got a little stagnant.”
A field goal by Austin O’Dell put the Trojans in a safe nine point lead in the third. For most of the fourth quarter, both teams were side-to-side in scoring.
Oswego went ahead 49-47, thanks to an outside shot. Alters was quick to respond with an 18-foot jumper to even the score.
A Dickerson free throw made it 52-49 and the Indians kept the momentum going. Yeoman scored an easy lay-up off a fast break. A travel, called on the Trojans, was followed by a deuce from Oldham and the game was out of reach. Grilz hit a 3-pointer with less than 30 seconds remaing but it only served as a consolation prize.
A road trip to Cherokee against Southeast tonight will be next. The Trojans managed to get many players in the game to keep the legs fresh for tonight. As far as Wescott is concerned, staying focused will be the key.
“The main thing will be having our legs and our energy,” Wescott said. “We played several kids tonight. But we just have to come out and be focused. Our kids play a lot of basketball everyday so I don’t think that’ll be too much of a problem.”
