HENRYVILLE
Ahead by two possession with fewer than two minutes left, Brownstown Central’s girls basketball team never panicked.
The Braves got the defensive tops, hit their free throws and controlled their offense to run out the clock.
Brownstown Central (5-1) won their fourth straight game Saturday — their second leg of back-to-back road games — by topping Henryville 50-40.
In the first quarter, the Braves hit five of their opening six shots to take a 13-5 lead by the 4:27-mark.
Madison Klinge scored eight points in the stretch, capped by back-to-back 3-pointers.
Baskets by Kristen Stuckwisch and Tayler Garland in the final 2:18 gave the Braves a 17-9 lead after eight minutes of play.
The Hornets outscored the Braves 10-4 through the first six minutes of the second quarter to cut the deficit to 2-19.
However, the Braves answered.
Garland sank a jumper from the elbow and buried a 3-pointer, and Payton Farmer got one to go, in the final 1:33 as the Braves took a 28-19 lead into the break.
Out of intermission, the Hornets scored five unanswered points to go down by one point.
The teams traded baskets, and free throws, until a free throw by Klinge and score by Halle Hehman put the Braves up 38-30.
The Hornets’ Allison Horn hit a trey with 20 ticks left, as they trailed the Braves by five going into the final eight minutes.
Henryville chipped away at the Braves’ lead, cutting their deficit to 42-38 with two minutes left.
Following a stop at 1:21, Garland hit two free throws before stealing the ball at mid-court and getting a layup to fall with 55 seconds.
After the Hornets hit two free throws, Kristen Stuckwisch and Shelby Stuckwisch each went 2-for-2 from the charity stripe to seal the win.
“We put our press back on a little bit to slow them down,” Braves coach Karla Rieckers said. “I thought we did a really nice job of not fouling them. We bailed them out a lot in the third quarter, but we did a much better job in the fourth quarter.”
In the fourth quarter, the Braves backed off their fast-paced offense.
“We had the lead and they wanted to pack it back in the zone,” Rieckers said. “I wanted them to bring it out of the zone, so we spread it out so we could get more one-on-ones and easy looks. I was pleased how we had composure at the end.”
Garland led the Braves with 17 points, Klinge added 11 and Kristen Stuckwisch recorded eight.
The Braves outrebounded the Hornets 22-20, with Farmer recording 10 to go along with six points.
Darian Nipper led the Hornets with 10 points.
Brownstown Central had eight turnovers in the game.
“It’s tough to play here,” Rieckers siad. “We knew that it would be tough not having Ashley (Schroer) and Hayley (Thomas), two regular players in our rotation, while playing back-to-back games. I was proud of our girls’ effort. They really dug in when they cut it to four points. We didn’t let that rattle us. I was proud of how they stepped up during that time.”
Brownstown will host Columbus East tomorrow.