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MENTONE - After the Tippecanoe Valley girls' basketball team suffered a 56-54 gut-wrenching home defeat to Caston, 20 minutes passed before Viking coach Mike Walters walked out of the locker room.
When he finally emerged after the chat with his team, the grim look on his face spoke volumes on his thoughts about the game. This was not going to be good.
"In 12 years of coaching, this is probably the most disappointing loss I've had," he said. "I thought we were the better team."
Caston upped its record to 6-0 with the win, while Valley dropped to 2-4.
Three phases of the game bothered Walters most on Wednesday: free throws, turnovers and mental lapses.
With 1:12 left, Caston took its biggest lead of the game, seven points, at 53-46. With 49 seconds left, a Brandi Fisher three-pointer trimmed the lead to 53-49. Teammate Kara Tucker then stole Caston's inbounds pass and threw the ball to Rhonda Doud, who hit a layup. Hardly any time ticked off the clock, and now the Vikings trailed by two, 53-51.
Caston made one free throw with 36 seconds left to push the lead to three at 54-51. The Vikings had the ball the next 24 seconds, until just 12 seconds remained.
Mental lapses? In those 20-plus seconds, even though they needed a three-pointer to tie, the Vikings never attempted one. They shot a two-pointer and missed. Caston had the ball, and forward Jessie Foltz hit two free throws with 10 seconds left to make it 56-51.
The Vikings got their three-pointer when Kara Tucker nailed one with 2.7 seconds left to make it 56-54. Too little too late.
"We talked about that," Walters said. "If players are going to become good players, they have to be able to think out on the floor themselves and recognize what has to be done.
"To me, that's an obvious. You need to look for the three-point shot. All that time went off the clock, and we did not attempt a three-pointer."
Turnovers? Valley had 26 in the game. Nine came in the second quarter, when the Caston full-court press harassed the Vikings. Valley saw a 22-16 lead with 4:23 left before halftime trimmed to a 24-22 lead 83 seconds later as the Comets cashed in the Valley turnovers for easy baskets.
The two teams then stayed within three points of each other until the fourth quarter.
"I was very disappointed in the way we handled their press," Walters said. "That's something I thought we wouldn't have any problems with. We had problems getting the ball in bounds. Once we got it in bounds, we had trouble getting it up the floor. That's something I thought would never happen to us.
Free throws? Caston attempted 31; Valley attemped 12. Caston made 18; Valley made seven.
"Very seldom are you going to win a game when there's that much difference," Walters said. "A lot of that's because we're not moving our feet on defense."
Dusty Hubenthal scored 17 and had seven steals for Caston. Foltz added 16 and Stephanie Scott 15. Tucker, who made four three-pointers, led Valley with 14 points. Fisher added 13 and Bonnie Bickel 12.
Valley hosts Valparaiso at 11 a.m. Saturday.
"Look at our schedule," Walters said. "We have Valparaiso coming in Saturday. We turn right around and play Triton on Monday. Triton's another very good team.
"Our record's 2-4. We're right where we were at last year. That's not where I wanted to be at.
"You can say this is the fifth undefeated team we've played so far this year. But at some point in time, if you're going to be a good team, you have to step up and beat somebody better."
