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There was plenty to glean from a game featuring two of the state’s top girls basketball programs. On Saturday, Dec. 13 at the Reese Center in Berlin, the Hiland Lady Hawks did something that no team was able to do last season: They dealt the Lady Knights of West Holmes a defeat, winning 53-40.
While it was a monumental victory in a season in which both teams have huge expectations and still have unanswered questions, the game provided some gold nuggets for both coaching staffs. Considering the impressive stature of both programs, both teams welcomed the chance to be tested and improve against a quality opponent.
While the score will soon be lost amidst many other scores of games past, what these two teams could learn from this showdown will undoubtedly help them to get better, and help them get to where they want to be come the end of the year: Playing in Columbus.
1) The basketball must be made of gold
Hiland’s youthful guards may be short on varsity experience, but they take care of the basketball like it is a rare, precious gold. The Lady Hawks are averaging about seven turnovers per contest this year, a fantastic number for any team.
Turnovers lead to easy points and huge runs, and when you don’t have many, it limits the opponent’s opportunities to get off easy shots at the other end of the floor.
Between junior Brittany Miller, sophomores Jessica Troyer and Angela Troyer and freshmen Kennedy Schlabach and Sara Keim, the ball has been in very good hands thus far for Hiland, which handled West Holmes’ immense pressure all game long.
“I am very impressed with that,” said Hiland coach Dave Schlabach of his team.
2) Alex Starr is just that
When it comes to carving out a place in one of the state’s most prolific girls programs, you couldn’t do more than what Alex Starr did in this one. Starr’s 20-point, 10-rebound effort was the best individual performance of the game, despite coming in a loss. Starr scored half of her team’s points, and not only that, she absolutely wanted the ball in her hands. She appeared to be positive she was going to make plays, and most of the time she did.
“I thought Alex Starr played great,” said Schlabach of the West Holmes senior. “They have themselves another go-to kid now.”
“You could tell she wanted to win that basketball game,” said West Holmes coach Lisa Patterson. “Hopefully she carries that confidence level over into every single game. I have no doubt she will. She is a competitor who hates to lose. She did everything she possibly could.”
3) Cutting off the head of the snake
Defensively, people will look at the job Rachel Horn and company did on defending West Holmes athlete-supreme Hannah Clark and see it as key. However, perhaps the even bigger key to the entire game was Hiland’s ability to cut off point guard Alex Brown, the West Holmes senior point guard who makes the Lady Knights engine rev. With a host of swarming guards defending her, Brown had trouble igniting the West Holmes offense, and was harassed at every turn. That meant fewer opportunities to create entry passes into the high post, which is something West Holmes was hoping to exploit.
“We didn’t want to get into a shooting match with them. We wanted to take advantage of our interior offense, and I don’t think we did a very good job of doing that,” said Patterson.
4) Trying to find the groove
Lisa Patterson has said that her team’s shooting woes have been an ongoing challenge this season. A sluggish start against Wooster. A game-long grapple at Orrville. Now here at Hiland, where the team went a sub-par 16-of-52, numbers which include Starr’s impressive 8-of-16.
“It’s been an ongoing problem,” said Patterson of the shooting woes. We’ve been struggling with that for the last four games. It’s going to happen. You just have to play through it, and hopefully your defense wins you basketball games. But tonight, I was a little disappointed in our defense. We had established what we wanted to do and didn’t exactly follow through on that.
“You hope at some point you get on a hot streak. It will come.”
5) Traditionally speaking
The Hiland versus West Holmes game has been one full of history and talent. This year’s contest was no different. Over the past nine seasons these two teams have played toe-to-toe, Hiland now leading that span five wins to four. West Holmes currently leads toe overall record 17-13.
But what is more important is that these two teams represent the very best in girls high school basketball in the state of Ohio.
“It’s Holmes County,” said Patterson. “Two teams that fill a basketball gym up for girls basketball. Tell me another county in the state of Ohio that does that?
“This is a tremendous community we live in, and I remind the girls of that all the time.”
“I got here at 4:30 and there was a line of West Holmes people outside the door,” said Schlabach with a laugh. “I love it. To have a great rivalry, both teams have to gradually win some games. I don’t know what it has been the last 10 years, but it has been a good rivalry, with a lot of respect and a little dislike, which is what a rivalry is.”
6) There’s value, win, lose or draw
Regardless of who was the victor, both teams came out of this contest the better for having faced the challenge. The mere fact that each team got to play a tremendous program is a plus. But each got to also face some of the questions the coaching staff had coming into the season, and both coaches will now make adjustments and improve their teams, which is exactly what a big game this early in the season should do.
“It gave us a great measuring stick early,” said Schlabach. “What an atmosphere. The kids got a chance to get that game in their hip pocket early.”
Patterson agreed.
“In a game like this, you want to experience it, and learn form it. This is definitely a game film we will want to watch and dissect and figure out where things went wrong.”
7) The Lady Knights miss Macaulay
Yes, early in the year, coaches will tell you that injuries afford other players the opportunity to step up and prove themselves, ultimately making the team better. However, that said, West Holmes definitely misses the inside presence of Brittleigh Macaulay, who has been out with an illness the past three games and counting.
However, not having the six-footer in the middle of the paint and on the block goes beyond them being able to pound the ball inside for easy scores.
It also shortens up Patterson’s rotation, meaning she has to go even deeper on to her unproven bench.
“She is a big part,” said Patterson of Macaulay, who played a token 90 seconds. “We’ve got to start to get her playing in the flow of a game again. She was a non-factor, and we knew that.”
Schlabach knew they had dodged a bullet in terms of getting a win, but even he and his staff admitted that they would have liked Macaulay in there at full strength, just to see how they would respond to a huge, talented inside presence.”
8) Rebounding equals desire
Hiland will be at a height disadvantage in just about every game they play this year. That means fundamental positioning and simple desire become incredibly crucial to the team when it comes to rebounding. In four games, the Lady Hawks have not been outrebounded, and in this game, players like Alex Troyer and Horn were grabbing offensive rebounds. Not only that, but Keim, perhaps the smallest player on the floor who has an eerie resemblance to former Hiland guard Jenica Schrock, right down to the fierceness in the paint, grabbed a couple of big boards on the offensive glass.
The biggest play in basketball is the offensive rebound,” said Schlabach. “That’s our philosophy, and it is an effort thing. West Holmes is great at that too.”
“They might have been a little bit hungrier for it than we were,” said Patterson of the rebounding. “Most of those were long shots producing long rebounds, and they beat us to the ball, wherever it was.”
9) 50 is the magic number
Coach Schlabach believes in his team’s half-court defense. It is strong. It is quick, and it is deep. He firmly believes that they can limit teams in scoring. So, the magic number for Hiland every night is 50, as in, how do they score 50 points. In this one, it wasn’t easy, and it did take some free throws late to salt away the victory, but it was 50 nonetheless.
“Our half-court defense is good, so we just need to figure out ways to get to 50,” said Schlabach.
10) Stats don’t mean nuthin’
Rachel Horn entered the contest on an 0-for-14 struggle from beyond the arc. That mean absolutely nothing. Horn buried the game’s first score with a triple. She hammered home another one to make it 6-0. She knocked down a third one in a crucial run during the second half when the Lady Knights threatened.
Statistics are just that, nothing but numbers of the past. Shooting is a state of mind, and if you think it’s going in, chances are it probably will.
For two quality programs whose girls have made such a monumental commitment to excellence, this game continues to be one which brings about everything a head coach could want in a regular season contest, whether they are able to escape with a victory or not.
Plus, both teams have a huge amount of respect for the other’s program. Having two top programs in the state within 15 miles of each other is a rarity, a treat and something to cherish for local sports fans.
Both teams have shown great hustle, work ethic desire, and most of all, respect in the way they have represented themselves, their schools and their communities.
