GIBSONBURG — With a look at the Suburban Lakes League standings one could have predicted the outcome of
Tuesday night’s contest between Lake’s and Gibsonburg’s girls.
While still struggling, to an extent, offensively, the Flyers’ defense, once again led them to another
victory, this time by a score of 52-19.
Lake remained in first place in the SLL and improved to 17-0 overall and 10-0 in the league.
Meanwhile, the Golden Bears fell to 3-15, 1-9.
The Flyers’ defense was responsible for holding Gibsonburg to just 8-of-39 (21 percent) shooting from the
field, and forced 17 turnovers.
Though Lake’s pressure forced the Golden Bears to shoot erratically throughout the game, head coach Denny
Meyer still wassn’t entirely satisfied.
“It almost looked like a lot of times they (Gibsonburg) were happy to get a shot,” said Meyer. “But I
thought at times in the second quarter, even though they only had six points, our defense wasn’t real
good. We got beat off the dribble a little too easy and we got beat backdoor a couple times too easy.”
Before a dismal second quarter for both teams, Lake looked and played like the fourth-ranked team in the
state that it has become.
The Flyers jumped out to a 12-0 lead just 3:08 into the game.
Kaysie Brittenham got the scoring started for the Flyers by tallying two of her game-high 17 points with
an easy layup on the opening possession. Then, long-range shooter Hannah Cox gave the Flyers momentum by
hitting back-to-back 3-point baskets, setting the tone for Lake’s first-quarter dominance.
The Flyers finished the opening period shooting 10-of-13 (77 percent) from the floor, resulting in a 23-4
scoring edge. Brittenham accounted for nine of her points in the quarter, which included her only
3-point basket of of the game.
“I think those were really good shots,” Meyer said of his team’s first-quarter performance. “We figured
that they (Gibsonburg) would come out in a zone and we talked about having patience. I thought we were
very patient and getting very good looks. And we were getting them with the people that we wanted. The
outside shots were Hannah and Kaysie like we want, we hit Alyssa (Shaffer) inside a couple times like we
need to do, and I think it was just patience.”
From that point on, Lake didn’t look like the team it knows it is.
In the second quarter, both teams shot just 1-of-11 (nine percent) from the floor.
The Flyers’ only make was another basket from beyond the arc for Cox, who finished the game with 12
points.
The majority of Lake’s other 10 shots came from inside the paint and underneath the basket, and the
Flyers simply could not finish their plays.
Meyer suggested that it was again, like past games, it was “a lack of focus. I think we have a hard time
keeping it a whole game, our focus. And that’s got to change. We have to be able to play a complete
game.”
Meyer made the point clear that in moving forward, his team needs to make those easy shots and improve
its scoring.
“We go through games where we’ll shoot real well some games and we have other games where do don’t shoot
real well,” added Meyer. “I think we play pretty good defense against no matter who we play … we just
have to be able to score. And again we’ve talked all year, we need multiple people to score.”
The Flyers then put things away, out-scoring Gibsonburg, 22-13 in the second half.
Gibsonburg won the junior varsity game 34-25. Mallory Lee was the top scorer for the Flyers with 10
points.
LAKE 52, GIBSONBURG 19
LAKE
Brittenham, 5-1-4—17; Woodruff, 0-1-0—3; Johnson, 0-0—0; Cox, 1-3-1—12; Pennington, 0-0—0; Huston, 3-2—8;
Cowell, 0-0—0; Shaffer, 4-0—8; LaPlante, 0-0—0; Lee, 2-0—4. TOTALS: 15-5-7—52.
GIBSONBURG
L. Busdeker, 1-0—2; Copley, 2-0—4; J. Busdeker, 1-0—2; Damschroder, 1-1-0—5; Reynolds, 0-0—0; Gerbich,
0-0—0; DuShane, 2-2—6; Hoffman, 0-0—0; Doering, 0-0—0; Hudson, 0-0—0. TOTALS: 7-1-2—19.
LAKE 23 7 9 13 —52
GIBSONBURG 4 2 6 7 —19
Junior varsity: Gibsonburg, 34-25.
