BLOOMFIELD

While the Brownstown Central girls basketball couldn’t repeat as champions at the Eastern Greene Toby Yoho Classic, they finished with a pair of wins on Day 2 of the tournament to finish in fifth place.

The Braves started their day with a 58-38 victory against Owen Valley.

In the first quarter, the Braves jumped out to a 6-1 lead behind a free throw by Payton Farmer, 3-pointer by Morgan Wehmiller and basket from Grace Jaynes.

With an 11-7 lead after eight minutes of play, Brownstown Central went on a 12-0 run to start the second quarter capped by an and-one conversion by Kristen Stuckwisch with 4:35 left in the half.

Owen Valley responded with an 8-0 run of its own, but trailed the Braves 27-17 at intermission.

Jaynes hit back-to-back baskets before Shelby Stuckwisch and Farmer added field goals to put the Braves up 35-21 with 2:30 on the clock in the third quarter.

Leading 38-25 after 24 minutes of play, the Braves tallied 20 points in the fourth quarter while holding Owen Valley to 13 to secure a shot at the fifth place finish.

Braves coach Karla Rieckers said one of the points of emphasis on the day was to attack on the offensive side of the ball.

“I think we’re a better team when we attack,” she said. “We have a tendency to stand around when we play against zone instead of attacking the basket. (Owen Valley) started with a zone and we wanted to push the ball ahead so they couldn’t set their zone up.”

Farmer led the Braves with 11 points and Kristen Stuckwisch tallied nine.

Brownstown Central outrebounded Owen Valley 30-18, led by Jaynes’ six boards.

Later that evening, Brownstown Central kept its aggressive momentum by taking a 16-7 lead against Boonville in the first quarter.

The Braves would hold the Pioneers to less than double-digit scoring in the first three quarters, despite only scoring three points in the third, to manage a 47-33 win.

Morgan Wehmiller had 13 points to lead Brownstown Central, and Hallie Mockobee finished with 13 for Boonville.

While the Braves may have a young team, Rieckers is confident in her team and said she thinks that age is no longer an excuse moving forward.

“We’re over halfway through the season now and we have to come out ready to play every game,” she said. “We can’t use the ‘we’re young’ (excuse) now because we’ve played half a season. We need to be sure we’re ready to go and ready to play.”

Trinity drops pair

Things went from bad to worse for the Trinity Lutheran girls basketball team as it fell to Boonville 57-51 before getting routed by Owen Valley 52-21 on Tuesday.The Cougars finished eighth in tourney play, going 1-2 during the two-day span.In Game 1 against Boonville, Trinity battled with the Pioneers.

After taking a 13-10 advantage in the first quarter, the teams stood deadlocked at 22-all at the half.

Maddie Roark opened the third quarter with a 3-pointer for Trinity and would score nine of her team’s 20 points as the Cougars led 42-41 heading into the final eight minutes.

A 3-pointer by sophomore Morgan Gabbard put Trinity up 46-43 with 6:11 remaining.

The Cougars offense then went stagnant, as they only recorded one more filed goal the rest of the way and Boonville hit enough free throws to secure a win.

“We tried to keep them wide and spread them out,” Cougars coach Lang said. “We didn’t screen. We need to have kids coming off screens and flares and taking open shots. It takes five people to run an offense, not one.”

Boonville went 21 for 34 from the free-throw line to Trinity’s 19 for 26.

“For the first time in a while I think our youth showed down the stretch,” Lang said. “We kind of lost it mentally a little bit. (Boonville) crashed the boards and we didn’t have an answer for that. We need to be more mentally prepared to know the situation and not lose our focus on the court.”

The offensive woes continued for Trinity later into the day, as they didn’t score a single point in the first quarter against Owen Valley.

Owen Valley took a 22-7 lead into halftime, and held the Cougars to four points in the fourth quarter in the blowout win.

Lauren Godwin led the Patriots with 13 points and Payton Cattorini amassed 12.