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Punishing second half costs Ramettes game |
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Saturday, 09 January 2010 |
By Joseph Bell
JOHNSONBURG – The Lady Wolves used a 20-1 third quarter to break open a close game en route to a dominating 54-27 win last night over the Johnsonburg Ramettes.
Facing a 20-18 halftime deficit, the Lady Wolves stormed into the third quarter with a 15-0 run, including three field goals from Kane junior guard Ashley Wilson, who paced the Lady Wolves with nine points.
The scoring spurt took up most of the quarter as the Ramettes finally broke the streak with 1:28 remaining as sophomore forward Kiana Myers converted a free throw.
But Johnsonburg's scoring woes continued into the fourth quarter as they were unable to mount a comeback. Junior forward Justis Myers added two field goals in the quarter to give her a game-leading 11 points on the night but a 36-7 second half doomed the home team.
"I hate to be a robot about it but it's turnovers, just turnovers," Johnsonburg head girls basketball coach Mike Zilkofski said following the loss, his team's sixth defeat of the season. "I told the girls that we're not going to win by turning the ball over 30 to 40 times, it just isn't going to happen.
"There's a panic button that they must be pushing, I don't know what happened out there. In the first half, they played great. Kane's shooting was off in the first half and they definitely shot better in the second half."
The Ramettes were without senior point guard Becca Myers as she suffered a season-ending knee injury Thursday night against St. Marys. To compensate, Zilkofski started freshman guard Rhianon Fowler.
"Rhianon (Fowler), for her first time out there, she handled the ball really well and while she had some turnovers, I expected that," Zilkofski said. "We're going to have to work with her and she'll learn as she goes on. We didn't have a practice for her since Becca (Myers) got hurt, we had to have Rhianon (Fowler) come in immediately since we had back-to-back games.
"We didn't really get to sit down with (Fowler) and show her what she has to do on the offense and defense, she was more less forced into this. Coming from the junior varsity level as a freshman, out of 10 I'd give her a five, and under the circumstances, you have to accept that. We do accept that as coaches and she's going to be it for the rest of the year."
But looking ahead at the rest of the season, Zilkofski said his team will have no success if their turnover woes continue.
"I don't know how to explain the turnovers and I don't know how to fix it," Zilkofski said. "We work on fundamentals every day and while they do it in practice, they just don't do it on the court (during a game)."
Zilkofski also is disappointed with his team's scoring ability as before the season started, the fourth-year head coach envisioned a high-powered quick offense.
"Right now, we have no scorers, nobody has stepped up to score and I have no outside threat," Zilkofski said. "A lot of teams are going to see that, box us in and make us beat them on the outside.
"In practice, everybody is getting extra reps with shooting and somebody will have to step up and make their shots. We're young now with only one senior on the floor so it's a work in progress."
WIth a 3-6 record in nine games, the Ramettes have scored 319 points for approximately 35 points-per-game.
"But it'll be a long season if we keep this pace of 30 turnovers a game going, we're not going to win too many games with that," Zilkofski said. "Hopefully that gets through to them and they work a little bit harder in practice.
"They played an excellent first half while taking the ball to the basket but we just have to lumber on." |
