BOURBON – While games aren't won on paper, Meredith Brouyette and Tippecanoe Valley High School's varsity girls basketball team left no doubt on the court Wednesday night. Playing at non-conference rival Triton, Brouyette matched her jersey number with 14 points in the first quarter, as the Class 3A No. 8 Lady Vikings raced out to a 20-0 lead and cruised to a dominating 66-29 win. Brouyette, who scored a game-high 17 points – all in the first half – was 5 of 5 from the field in the opening quarter, including 4 of 4 from three-point range. She was 6 of 6 from the field at halftime after adding another trey in the second quarter. “We started off bad, and they're pretty good,” said Triton coach Adam Heckaman, whose team fell to 3-8 on the season, though it entered Wednesday's game after winning three of its last four. “We wanted to try and take (Anne) Secrest away, and I felt like we did a good job early covering her. We lost No. 14. We didn't find her. She can make shots, and she did. Those two are the ones we wanted to key in on and we didn't do a good job keying in on her, and that helped them get that huge start. Offensively, we don't have enough firepower quite yet to overcome a start like that.” The Lady Vikings, who improved to 8-1 on the season, led 20-3 after one quarter of play, 34-10 at halftime and 52-18 at the end of the third quarter. The final score was Valley’s largest lead of the game. “We’ve talked about that all year, that if we get our shooters going with our inside game that we have, we can be a pretty tough team to beat,” said Valley coach Chris Kindig. “It was really nice to see her (Brouyette) get going tonight, and from a team perspective everybody contributed tonight. We got a lot of different players in different spots, there were different combinations, that was good to see. The girls played hard, and I thought they came in focused.” Youngstown State University recruit Anne Secrest tallied 15 points and nine rebounds in the win, while Hannah Dunn and Brynda Krueger chipped in with 10 and eight points, respectively, and Sophie Bussard finished with six. The Lady Vikings finished the game 24 of 43 from the field overall and 12 of 16 from the charity stripe. When Brouyette wasn’t knocking shots down from the outside, Secrest, Dunn and Krueger were doing so in the paint. The trio combined to make 14 of 16 field goal attempts and 6 of 8 free throws en route to 33 points. Valley was equally impressive with its defensive effort, as the Lady Vikings made 17 steals, scoring 27 points off Triton turnovers. “Defensively we’ve been playing pretty well,” said Kindig. “We need to continue to do that. Obviously when we get in the tournament we’re gonna have to continue to play good defense to make a run.” The Lady Trojans finished the game 9 of 37 from the field overall, 3 of 15 from the arc, and 8 of 10 at the free throw line. Hannah Wanemacher led Triton with 14 points, while Brooklyn Beatty and Charlotte Morris scored five and four points, respectively. “They weren’t falling tonight,” Heckaman said of Wanemacher’s shot attempts, which saw her finish the game 4 of 15 against a stingy Valley defense. “She got some good looks early. They did a good job covering her, they chased her around a little bit with one girl for a while, and that’s not something she’s seen yet. She missed four games. She’s in her third game back, so somebody chasing her around is not something we’re used to yet. We’ll have to adjust to that. “I just felt we weren’t aggressive enough going to the basket early on. It was very easy for them to guard us on the perimeter because that’s all we wanted to shoot. If you get a couple girls to drive to the basket, maybe that changes.” Valley will be in action again Friday in a Three Rivers Conference battle at North Miami, while Triton hosts Hoosier North Athletic Conference foe Caston on Saturday.
TIPPECANOE VALLEY 66, TRITON 29 TV 20 14 18 14 – 66 Tri 3 7 8 11 – 29 Valley – Olivia Trippiedi 0-1 1-2 1, Meredith Brouyette 6-10 0-0 17, Addy Miller 1-5 0-0 3, Sophie Bussard 1-5 4-4 6, Brynda Krueger 4-4 0-1 8, Asia O’Connor 1-1 1-2 3, Morgan Brazo 1-3 1-1 3, Hannah Dunn 4-4 2-2 10, Anne Secrest 6-8 3-4 15. Totals 24-43 12-16 66. Triton – Sara Stevens 0-4 0-0 0, Quinn Downing 1-1 0-0 2, Hannah Wanemacher 4-15 4-4 14, Jaela Meister 1-9 0-0 3, Brooklyn Beatty 1-1 3-4 5, Nicole Sechrist 0-3 1-2 1, Shayla May 0-2 0-0 0, Charlotte Morris 2-2 0-0 4, Megan McFarland 0-0 0-0 0, Courtney Jennings 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 9-37 8-10 29. Three-pointers – Valley 6 (Brouyette 5, Miller), Triton 3 (Wanemacher 2, Meister); Rebounds – Valley 26 (Secrest 9), Triton 23; Turnovers – Valley 10, Triton 18; Fouls – Valley 14, Triton 11; Fouled out – none; Records: Valley 8-1, Triton 3-8 JV – Valley 27, Triton 23
