By Noah Dalton
MITCHELL – Mitchell High School returned to the court on Saturday for their first game in two weeks, taking on Shakamak in a losing effort, falling by a final score of 61-40.
Despite the lopsided appearance of the final score, the matchup was closer than the final tally might suggest, as the Bluejackets ended a tense first half with a one-point lead over the Lakers.
It wasn’t until the second half when Shakamak pulled away by outscoring Mitchell 40-18 in the final two quarters that either side could accumulate a lead larger than five
The second quarter was the best showing of the night for Mitchell, with the team scoring 12 points and connecting on 45% of their shots from the floor, led by senior Briley Dicks, who sank 5/6 attempts in the period to finish the half with a team-high 14 points.
“We hit shots, the shots we were supposed to take. We had a really a lot of good shots and we hit them,” said Bluejackets head coach Dakota Brasher. “I bet our field goal percentage in the first half was probably the best it’s been all year and we only scored 22 points in the first half, but it was kind of a slower game. How that happens is Shakamak likes to play really fast and we were hitting shots and were able to get back in our defense and slow them down.”
After some costly turnovers and foul trouble for the Bluejackets, including losing their top scorer so far this season, Jillian Bond, for much of the third quarter after she’d picked up her fourth foul of the game. to start the second half, the Lakers went on a run, scoring 10 unanswered points and taking control of the game.
“In the half second half, their shots start falling. We start turning the ball over a little bit more. They get a lot of these three-on-two, four-on-three, five-on-four opportunities and they score 40 points in the second half,” said Brasher.
“Foul trouble hurt us a little bit. Jill is our centerpiece, however, we’ve got to have girls, if that does happen, we’ve got to have girls step up. We kind of have a next girl up mentality and everybody on that bench we’re gonna need at some point and we have needed every girl on that bench at some point throughout the season. We’re gonna have a girl come in and we’ve got to step up, and we’ve got to be able to guard.”
After a strong first-half showing against a solid Lakers team, who went on a 10-game winning streak earlier this season, Brasher feels his team is showing considerable improvement from where they were earlier in the season.
“I feel like we’re really close to getting over that hump, where we’re going to have everybody show up one day at a time. And man, we played really, really hard and our energy in our effort, I’m not fighting that anymore,” Brasher said.
“Our energy and our effort is unbelievable, from the top down, and I’ve told the girls that I’m not coaching effort, and I’m not coaching energy. And they have responded and I don’t have to coach effort and energy. Now we can really work on what wins games and we’re getting better. We’ve just got to stay at it. We’re really close to beating a lot of really good teams, and I know the scoreboard might not show it, but that game was closer than what the scoreboard shows.”
Stats
Mitchell
- Jillian Bond: 9 points, 1/5 shooting, 7/11 FT, 4 rebounds
- Briley Dicks: 15 points, 6/10 shooting, 3/6 FT, 8 rebounds
- Leighann Thompson: 4 points, 2/2 shooting, 0/0 FT, 0 rebounds
- Gwen Eastridge: 0 points, 0/2 shooting, 0/0 FT, 1 rebound
- Anna Sowders: 9 points, 3/5 shooting, 0/0 FT, 2 rebounds
- Paisley Modglin: 3 points, 1/5 shooting, 0/0 FT, 3 rebounds
- Jorja Lamm: 0 points, 0/1 shooting, 0/0 FT, 0 rebounds
- Ella Gerkin: 0 points, 0/3 shooting, 0/0 FT, 0 rebounds
Shakamak
- Aubree Langford: 11 points, 4/10 shooting, 1/1 FT, 1 rebound
- Chase Hammond: 3 points, 1/3 shooting, 0/0 FT, 0 rebounds
- Elayni Stone: 6 points, 2/8 shooting, 2/4 FT, 4 rebounds
- Madelyn Kennett: 6 points, 3/6 shooting, 0/0 FT, 10 rebounds
- Aubrie Lambermont: 22 points, 9/14 shooting, 0/0 FT, 5 rebounds
- Ema Janouskova: 11 points, 4/9 shooting, 1/4 FT, 4 rebounds
- Emma Gonzalez: 2 points, 1/1 shooting, 0/0 FT, 0 rebounds
