BOURBON - Hosting a Bethany Christian Lady Bruins team averaging 20 points per game, Triton girls basketball coach Adam Heckaman had to be expecting a low scoring game Monday.
That's what he got.
After host Triton trailed 7-2 at the end of the first quarter and 11-10 at the half, both offenses picked up a little in the second half, as Triton captured a 35-31 victory and improved to 3-4 on the year.The 31 points scored by Bethany (0-5) was the most the Lady Bruins have scored this season, as they also suffered a 56-7 loss to Northridge on Nov. 17. However, the low-scoring squad was able to stick with a Lady Trojans team that finished the night hitting 13 of its 46 shots.
"Some nights the shots don't fall, and that was tonight," Heckaman said. "Our defense was pretty good. If we're going to hold a team to 11 (in a half), even if we don't score a point, we're still in the game and that's key. There are nights when the shots don't fall. The girls did a good job of staying close when we weren't hitting."
Having a hard time penetrating the Lady Bruins' zone, Triton settled for passing the ball around the three-point line, resulting in a 17-percent field goal percentage in the opening half, including an 0-of-10 effort from behind the arc.
"We were hesitant against (the zone)," Heckaman said. "They were really packing it in the paint, leaving the elbow wide open. We got (the ball) to the elbow a couple times in the first half, but we just didn't execute. Once we did get the ball there, we didn't make good passes out of it to the weak side."
Heckaman subbed sophomore Megan Howdeshell into the game to start the second quarter, and the move began to loosen things up as she scored four points and grabbed five rebounds in the quarter, cutting the Bethany lead to 11-10 at the half.
"She's a big, physical player," Heckaman said of Howdeshell. "Getting her to flash to that elbow, getting a little more size there, they weren't able to push her off it. Then she was able to get the ball, then look to the opposite side, which was wide open against the zone."
Down by one going into the third quarter, Triton outscored Bethany 12-2 to take a 22-13 lead, but then Lady Bruins junior Marla ZumFelde hit a buzzer-beating shot between the three-point line and half-court, cutting the deficit to 22-16.
"That's a big play for them," Heckaman said of the shot. "It was a big momentum swing. We're looking to put the game away there, getting the ball to open the fourth, then she nails that and cuts it back to six. It kind of deflated our girls a little bit."
The shot wasn't the only one ZumFelde hit, as she scored 23 points on 8-of-10 shooting while also nabbing seven rebounds and recording two steals.
"We lost her a couple times in the first half on out-of-bounds plays," Heckaman said of ZumFelde, who scored more than her team's average Monday. "The girls did a better job of finding her in the second half. She's a good player."
While ZumFelde was scoring 74-percent of her team's points, the Lady Trojans used a much more balanced attack to hold on for the win.
Triton junior Aubrey Boardman led her squad with seven points, while junior Allison Thacker, Howdeshell and senior Brittany Wallace scored six points each.
The Lady Trojans open their Northern State Conference schedule Saturday at Knox, where the junior varsity tips off at 6 p.m.
