Despite not sharing a conference, the Tippecanoe Valley and Rochester girls basketball teams were able to renew their rivalry earlier this season, with the Lady Vikings coming out on top with a 28-point win. The two teams met for the second time this season on Friday night with the stakes a lot higher: a spot in the IHSAA 3A Sectional championship game. The contest was nothing like the first, coming down to the final shot after an incredibly tight game. In the end, Valley was able to escape with a 43-40 victory.
“A win is a win, and at the end of the day that’s all that matters,” Tippy Valley head coach Chris Kindig said after the game. “Our goal coming into tonight was to have a chance to cut down some nets tomorrow. I’m not thrilled with the performance but we don’t have time to be upset about it.”
The early going of the game made it clear to spectators that points would be hard to come by throughout the game, with no points being scored by either team through the first three minutes of play. Perhaps not playing for over a week made the Lady Vikings a little rusty, as Valley turned the ball over on each of their first three possessions before finally getting their first points on an Ava Egolf three.
The visitors didn’t look rusty on defense though, as the Lady Vikings were forcing as many, if not more, turnovers as they were committing. Like Valley, Rochester would struggle to get anything going on offense early on, falling victim to the suffocating trap and press that they were going up against.
A factor that could have led to the incredibly low scoring quarter was the lack of pace the game contained. The two sides rarely went more than a possession without a foul being called, with the total number of penalties announced in the first being nine. Two of those fouls were on Valley defensive star Chesnee Miller, who ended up sitting a majority of the first half.
After eight minutes of play, the score sat tied at 5-5. The second quarter would prove to be a much better one for Valley, as the visitors were able to score 19 in the period. The Lady Zebras began finding success of their own as well, leading to an incredibly tense, back-and-forth quarter that remained a one-possession game for the majority of it.
With just a few minutes to go in the half, Egolf provided the Lady Vikings with the scoring they had so desperately needed, going on a personal 6-0 run in a tie game to give the visitors their largest lead yet in the game. Junior Lucy Hayden came off the bench at the end of the first and played the entirety of the second, providing her team with some tough defense and three points at the charity stripe.

    Tippecanoe Valley senior Ava Egolf scores during the first period of Friday night's sectional game against Rochester. Photo by Gary Nieter
Up by four and possessing the ball with five seconds to go before halftime, Valley executed it’s last play of the half perfectly, with Egolf passing it off to Gaby Gonzalez, who would hit a three at the buzzer to give the Lady Vikings their largest lead so far at seven at 24-17. The 17 points scored by Rochester were one more than the Lady Zebras scored in the teams’ first meeting earlier this year.
“We knew it was not going to be as easy as the first time around. We did not underestimate this team and they came to play tonight,” Kindig said. “They played some great defense at times and made it really difficult on us.”
The second half began much like the first did, with minimal scoring, largely in part to Rochester spending over a minute on offense to begin the third quarter. Two and half minutes into the third, Kelsey Cox would get on the board with her first bucket of the night to start the scoring off.
Through five minutes, each side had only managed three points, leaving the point differential at seven. Over the final three, there would be multiple instances in which Valley would extend its lead to nine or ten and Rochester would cut it down to four or five, but each time, the opposing side was ready with an answer. Eventually, the Lady Zebras would get closer, but not much. Heading into the final eight minutes of play, the Lady Vikings were holding onto a five-point advantage.
Early in the fourth, Valley extended its lead to a new high, nine points, after Egolf’s fourth three of the game and a free throw by Cox. Valley’s defense, which had remined consistent to this point, intensified even further, not giving the Lady Zebras an inch of room to do anything.
With the defense cranked up to eleven and the offense putting together some good possessions, Valley began the process of putting the game away by going up double digits with five minutes to play.
But Rochester wasn’t done. The home side did some clamping of their own on the defensive end as time continued to wind down, getting the series of stops it needed to get back into the game. They’d also start finding it on the offensive end, with Aubrey Wilson scoring five straight points to make it a six-point game with two and a half minutes to go. A minute later, the two teams were separated by just three.
Valley had multiple opportunities at the end of the game to ice it at the free throw line, but was unable to, continuing a theme that had been present all night. Valley finished the game 11-30 on their freebie shots. While the Lady Vikings did struggle at the stripe, they were able to burn clock without fear of trouble by grabbing the offensive rebounds in the biggest spot of the game, which would cost Rochester a couple of seconds and more free throw attempts each time.
“We have a shootaround tomorrow morning so I can promise you that we’re going to get some free throw attempts up,” Kindig said. “The players that were shooting are usually ones that make them. I think after a while it got in their heads. We were lucky to survive.”
In the end, it came down to one shot. Trailing by three with nine seconds to go, the Lady Zebras raced down the court for one final attempt. The final heave would fall short, and the slight contact on the shot would not be called, allowing Valley to escape with a narrow victory.
Ava Egolf led all scorers in the game with 22 points to go with five rebounds. Miller added six, while Gonzalez, Cox and Hayden each finished with five. Gonzalez also added six rebounds and four steals.
Tippecanoe Valley will take on Bremen Saturday night at Rochester for the sectional championship. Tipoff is scheduled for 7:30.
“Bremen played really well tonight, they’re going to challenge us,” Kindig said. “That Foster girl is a deadly shooter and her range is from pretty much anywhere on the court. It’s not going to be easy but we have a chance to compete and that’s what matters."