BREMEN – Tippecanoe Valley girls basketball coach Chris Kindig must have given his team a pretty inspired halftime speech Thursday night in Bremen. After committing 25 first-half turnovers and trailing 33-28 in their season opener against the Bremen Lady Lions (0-1), the Tippecanoe Valley Lady Vikings (1-0) opened the second half on a 22-0 run en route to a 64-47 victory. “I was not real happy,” Kindig said about his halftime message. “We talked about the fact that the first three, four minutes of the third quarter were critical. “We talked about taking control of the game and just relaxing,” he added. “Our girls kind of had that ‘deer in the headlights’ look in the first half. With the experience I have, I really didn’t expect that.” Turning the ball over repeatedly, including four-straight possessions after going up 2-0, the Lady Vikings couldn’t get out of their own way in the first 16 minutes of the game. While Valley was fumbling the ball around, Bremen got some nice outside shooting, as junior Ashley Lucchese hit 3 of 7 three-point attempts and junior Sara Slabaugh also connected from downtown. “Their girls came out with a lot more intensity than we did and they got the early lead,” Kindig said. “They had a couple nice three-point shooters out there. The press finally took hold in the second half. We got a little bit of a cushion and things rolled from there.” The Valley press did begin to work as Bremen committed nine third-quarter turnovers, and didn’t score its first points until sophomore Brooke Fitch scored with 46 seconds remaining in the quarter. By the time Fitch scored, Valley had turned the 33-28 halftime deficit into a 50-33 lead. While Bremen shot 1 of 18 in the third quarter, seven different Lady Vikings scored in the frame, led by junior Kelsey Ball’s seven points. Ball’s play was a constant all night, as she scored a game-high 20 points on 8-of-11 shooting from the field, while also grabbing a team-high 10 rebounds to go with four assists, two steals and a blocked shot. “I have high expectations for her and I’ve said that the whole preseason,” Kindig said. “Her and Caylie Teel. She’s one of those that has to step up and she did tonight to replace that 20 points that (Staci) Groom provided last year, as well as Tory Keirn. I’m really proud of her effort. She played really hard tonight.” Teel also had a good night, filling the stat sheet with 13 points, five rebounds, five steals, four assists and a blocked shot. Ball and Teel were expected to led the team this season, but 6-foot-3 junior Sara Alexander provided a big punch in the season opener, blocking six shots coming off the bench. “She’s improved a lot from last year,” Kindig said of Alexander. “She’s that presence at the basket in the back of our press. It’s one of those things where she’s kind of an intimidating factor. She’s much quicker and faster than she was last year. She’s running the floor much better. I think she’s going to surprise people this year.” The Lady Vikings take a big step up in competition on Nov. 16 at Warsaw.
TIPPECANOE VALLEY 64, BREMEN 47 TV 13 15 24 12 – 64 B 19 14 2 12 – 47 Valley – Danielle Bussard 1-3 2-4 4, Caylie Teel 5-10 3-5 13, Kelsey Ball 8-11 4-7 20, Courtney Newsome 3-7 1-1 7, Connor Fraser 3-9 0-0 6, Taylor Trippiedi 0-5 1-4 1, Cara Hoffman 2-8 5-10 9, Robyn Dunnuck 0-0 0-0 0, Sara Alexander 1-3 2-2 4, Karis Tucker 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 23-56 18-33 64. Bremen – Ashley Lucchese 4-15 0-2 11, Megan Stouder 1-7 0-0 2, Sara Slabaugh 5-14 1-3 13, Rachel Czarnecki 1-4 4-5 6, Brooke Snyder 2-5 4-6 8, Jasmine Schafer 1-9 1-2 3, Cassie Sears 1-3 0-0 2, Alexa Harshbarger 0-2 0-0 0, Sabrina Gilley 0-3 0-0 0, Alyssa Bailey 0-0 0-0 0, Brooke Fitch 1-1 0-0 2. Totals 16-63 10-18 47. Three-point goals – Valley 0-3, Bremen 5-23 (Lucchese 3, Slabaugh 2); Team Fouls (fouled out) – Valley 17 (Fraser), Bremen 24; Turnovers – Valley 36, Bremen 32; Rebounds – Valley 43 (Ball 10), Bremen 32 (Snyder 14); Assists – Valley 17 (Newsome 5), Bremen 8 (Lucchese 3, Schafer 3); Steals – Valley 17 (Teel 5, Hoffman 5), Bremen 15 (Czarnecki 4); Blocks – Valley 8 (Alexander 6), Bremen 1; Records: Valley 1-0, Bremen 0-1 JV – Valley 35, Bremen 18 Valley – Tucker 16, Hanna Dalrymple 8, Hailyn Dunn 4, Emily Hillard 2, Madison Strong 2, Casey Dunn 2, Morgan Brazo 1
