LEWISBURG — Twin Valley South’s girls basketball team started out the season by splitting a pair of games, first dropping an opening day match-up 56-26 against Carlisle on Friday, Nov. 20, before using their speed and a good transition game to beat Northridge 45-37 on Saturday, Nov. 21.
Against Carlisle, South headed into the second only down three points, but a 20-point quarter – and one in which the Indians outscored them by 12 points – put the Panthers in a hole they couldn’t dig out of.
South didn’t produce much offense the entire game, only scoring five points in the third and nine points in the fourth.
“We had a lot of energy in the first quarter and we kind of fell out of our game plan a little and had to battle back,” said head coach Jeff Case.
They were led by Madison Johnson, who had six points while Mylan Crews added five, Emily Hutchings and Morgan Newhart both had four while Abby Creech and Haily Keener added three apiece.
The Panthers then turned their efforts toward Northridge, who lost to Tri-County North the night before.
South jumped out early, creating offense through their speed.
“Tonight, they gave me that energy for all four quarters,” said Case. “We followed the game plan well, attacked the basket, we were offensive-minded and we can’t really complain. I don’t really like how the fourth quarter went; we played not to lose instead of playing to win. But that’s all a process, that’s learning right now and this was a good win.”
The Panthers had a sizeable lead heading into the final frame but saw that lead get chopped down to four points before pulling together and getting the win.
“It all comes down to taking care of the basketball and our guards not turning the ball over. That’s what really hurt us in the fourth quarter,” said Case. “They need to learn how to play as the team ahead and not the team trying to catch up.”
Creech led all scorers with 18 on the day.
South was scheduled to take on Miami East on Tuesday, Nov. 24 before heading to Dixie for a matchup on Monday, Nov. 30. Their first home game will be on Tuesday, Dec. 1 against Milton Union with a 5:30 tip-off.
