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The Tippecanoe Valley girls basketball season didn’t get off to the best of starts, as the team was blown out by Norwell in the opener. Since then, it’s been a different story. On Friday night, the Lady Vikings defeated LaVille 52-18 for their fifth straight win, second in the Indiana Northern State Conference.
“We have a lot of kids who have played a lot of varsity minutes on this team. Norwell is tremendous. They did what they did to us, but I’m proud of the way the girls have responded to it,” head coach Rebekah Parker said after the game. “They learned from that experience and have moved forward.”
A pair of threes in the opening minute of the contest gave Tippy Valley an early 6-0 lead. However, the story in the early going was not the offense of the home team, but the defense. The Lady Vikings were pressing their opponents for the entire length of the court regardless of if they scored or not. The team’s ultra-aggressiveness was paying off in spades, as the Lady Lancers were turning the ball over more often than they were putting up shots.
After the hot start, Valley had only managed two points over the next four minutes. They were still taking care of business on the other end and even though the offense was still coming along, they were still able to maintain an eight-point lead.
“That’s our game plan. There are going to be lulls offensively so our defense can’t have that happen,” Parker said. “We definitely want to continue to be the aggressors on defense for the entire game.”
That’s exactly where things stood as the second quarter got going. However, the Lady Viking drought continued well into the period, allowing LaVille to begin to chip away at the deficit. It took over two minutes before a layup by Betty Shepherd finally put the home side on the board in the quarter.
With both offenses in disarray, time continued to tick off the clock with each defense continuing to win possession after possession. While they were not forcing the same amount of turnovers as their opponent, the Lady Lancers were forcing the home side into taking plenty of low-percentage shots.
After a three pointer by the visitors made it a four-point game with just four minutes until halftime, a big stretch by Hadley Wise doubled it in a matter of seconds. The junior made a layup, stole the inbounds pass and hit a second one to bring the lead right back up to eight.
Maycee Koch scored three straight following that spurt to extend the lead to double digits for the first time. A big triple by Gaby Gonzalez in the final seconds of the first half gave her a game-high eight points while also extending her team’s advantage to 14 at the break.
Sophomore Malaynie Costello of Valley shoots during Friday night's home game against LaVille...Nieter
The team only added on to it in the first few minutes of the third, as the steady combination of a suffocating defense and willingness to fight down low offensively was paying dividends. Three minutes into the quarter, the lead had been extended to 20.
“We needed a night like this. We’ve won a few in a row but none have felt great,” Parker said. “We’ve had good moments, and obviously you like to stack the wins, but we hadn’t strung together four whole quarters yet until tonight.”
It took over five minutes before the visitors scored their first points of the period, and by then Valley had taken full control of the game. The rest of the stanza belonged to the home team though, with everybody getting involved as the lead continued to grow and grow.
Heading into the 4th, the Lady Vikings were comfortably holding onto a 22-point edge. Even with everything going their way, the biggest cheer of the night from the Valley bench came when Malaynie Costello drew a charge early in the period.
Dalynne Bussard joined Wise in double figures with five minutes to go in the game, extending the Valley lead to over 30 in the process. Not long afterwards, Lillie Koch hit a free throw that made it a 35-point game, expediting the final two minutes.
Tippecanoe Valley (5-1, 2-0) hosts Rochester on Tuesday.
“We’re going to have to stick to the game plan, staying aggressive,” Parker said. “But we have to make sure not to allow easy baskets and trips to the free throw line.”
