AKRON - NorthWood head girls basketball coach Steve Neff said his team played one of its worst games of the season in a 41-36 loss to Wawasee Friday. And while the Panthers didn't look like world beaters, they did enough to leave Akron with a 50-36 win over host Valley Monday night.

The Vikings wrestled away the game's momentum in a frantic final 23.5 seconds that saw Valley rip off six straight points and turn a double-digit deficit to just four points at 28-24.

Senior guard Kara Kramer missed the back end of two free throw attempts with 23.5 seconds left in the second quarter. Hannah Krueger gathered the offensive board and found Holli Jackson, who connected on an old fashioned three-point play.

NorthWood looked to hold for the last shot but, when Laura Zeltwanger missed a jumper, Valley's Chelsy Rhoades gathered the board and was stripped of the ball. The loose ball took a fortuitous bounce and found Jackson, who streaked down the floor and found Kramer for a layup as time expired in the first half.

"The kids really got after it there," said Valley head coach Gary Teel of his team's late offensive outburst. "It really put us back in the game and I felt it gave us a chance. We just couldn't go out and make a basket (in the second half). We had three or four chances to pull ahead."

The Panthers became out of sync in the final three minutes of the first half as 6-foot-0 senior Audrey Duncan sat with foul trouble.

Duncan connected on all seven field goal attempts in the first half, scoring 19 first half points and NorthWood's first nine points of the game. Duncan finished the evening with 21 points on 8 of 8 shooting.

The 10-minute respite between halves may have been a detriment to the Vikings. As sharply as Valley ended the first half, they couldn't duplicate that success in the second half.

The Vikings shot a woeful 4 of 30 from the field in the second half for just 12 points.

In fact, both teams went scoreless in the third quarter until the 5:38 mark when Kara Kramer stole an entry pass intended for Duncan and went coast to coast for a layup to draw the Vikings to 30-28.

Cue NorthWood's Mandy Yoder.

The 5-foot-8 sophomore scored 16 second-half points, including 12 straight that spanned from the 4:44 mark of the third quarter to the 6:06 mark of the final period. Conversely, Valley as a team scored just four points. Rachel Sitts' jumper with 1:01 left in the third quarter was the Vikings' lone field goal over a 10-minute span.

"We had some open looks. I felt we moved the ball pretty decent. Sometimes we had some open looks at the basket. Unfortunately, the shot didn't go down. We didn't value the possession a couple of times where we needed to bring the ball down and make three or four passes and get the shot we wanted and we didn't," said Teel.

But Teel was quick to put the loss in perspective.

"They're kids. They're going to make mistakes. They're fighting hard and trying the best that they can. If every kid gives 110 percent that's, all you can ask of your kids," said Teel.

NorthWood shuffled around its lineup against Valley, starting freshman Mackenzie Lechlitner in place of Jen Kurtz.

Lechlitner wasn't a factor, shooting just 1 of 9 from the field for two points.

Valley inserted freshman Hannah Krueger to start the second half. Krueger was 0 of 2 from the field with three rebounds and a steal.

Kramer led the Vikings in scoring with 13 points and five rebounds. Jackson was the only other player in double digits for Valley with 10 points and five rebounds. Sitts and Rhoades added six and five points, respectively.

"It was a big game for us," said Neff of the win over Valley. "We played one of our worst games, I thought, last Friday. And we didn't have a chance to practice over the weekend. To come here and play a very good Valley team at Valley, I was concerned."

Another head coach, Rochester's Tony Stesiak, was on hand to scout for his team's Saturday night soiree against the Vikings in one of Valley's biggest rivalry games.

Valley, 8-6 overall, hosts the Zebras with tipoff set for 7:45 p.m. Saturday.

NORTHWOOD 50, VALLEY 36

NorthWood 16 12 13 9 - 50

T. Valley 11 13 6 6 - 36

NorthWood FG FT R S Pts.

*Egging 0-3 1-2 10 2 1

*Zeltwanger 2-7 2-2 5 2 7

*Lechlitner 1-9 0-0 5 0 2

*Yoder 7-12 5-6 4 0 19

*Duncan 8-8 5-7 8 0 21

Kurtz 0-1 0-0 2 0 0

Bechtel 0-0 0-0 1 0 0

Bough 0-0 0-0 0 0 0

Wisler 0-0 0-0 1 0 0

Totals 18-40 13-17 36 4 50

T. Valley FG FT R S Pts.

*Jackson 3-14 4-6 5 2 10

*Kramer 3-14 6-8 5 3 13

*Rhoades 3-13 0-0 5 2 7

*Rohrer 0-2 0-0 1 0 0

*Rathbun 0-1 0-0 2 0 0

Moore 0-0 0-0 0 1 0

Sitts 3-7 0-0 4 2 6

Krueger 0-2 0-0 3 1 0

Totals 12-53 4-8 25 11 36

Three-point goals - NorthWood 1-5 (Zeltwanger 1-3, Egging 0-2), T. Valley 2-19 (Kramer 1-3, Rhoades 1-7, Jackson 0-5, Rohrer 0-2, Sitts 0-1, Krueger 0-1). Turnovers - NorthWood 20, Valley 15 Fouls - NorthWood 15, T. Valley 13. Fouled out - None.

JV - NorthWood 47, T. Valley 29

Valley Scoring - Ashley Hendrix 6, Taylor Stoll 5, Hannah Krueger 4, Chelsea Culp, Kayla Newman 2, Jamie Weaver 2, Jessica Rice 2, Brittany Hoffer 2 [[In-content Ad]]