Alter rolls, Versailles hangs on; both advance to Division III district finals
COVINGTON — When Riley Smith left the Alter girls basketball lineup with a lower leg injury on Jan. 14, the Knights lost a one-point game to Solon. The Knights haven’t lost since.
On Tuesday night in their Division III sectional final against Madison at Covington High School, the Knights showed the evolution of a team coming together without a star player. They sprinted to an early 13-point lead and kept the lead in double digits for all but a few seconds in the third quarter and rolled to a 58-40 victory.
Maddie Moody, the other half of Alter’s 1-2 scoring punch, used her left-hand moves inside to score 18 points. Da’Shai Shepard, Alter’s other formidable post presence, scored two early baskets and finished with 10 points. Five other players scored at least five points, and all eight who played significant minutes executed the full-court and trapping defense.
That doesn’t mean the Knights aren’t ready to have the 6-foot-2 Smith back and enjoy her 14 points a game, length on defense and rebounding. Co-head coach Chris Hart said Smith will be in uniform Saturday when the Knights play Madiera (16-9) in a district final at Springfield High School. Hart said whether Smith plays depends on her progress this week.
“We talked about one person doesn’t have to fill her role,” Hart said of the day they knew she would be out at least a month. “It’s everybody has to do something a little bit more, and I think they’ve done that. It ends up being such a nice bonus if we get her back.”
The Knights (23-2) extended their winning streak to 10 games on the strength of their fast start that forced Madison (18-7) into multiple turnovers. The Mohawks called a timeout when the score hit 13-2 on Shepard’s fast-break layup barely three minutes into the game.
“It’s probably hard to mimic our pressure in practice, so I think that took a toll initially,” Hart said. “They adjusted a little bit, and we started taking shots that weren’t going in and kept shooting those in the first half. A couple of those go in, and it’s a different game at halftime.”
Madison settled down behind Kylie Wells, who scored nine of her 20 points in the second quarter. The Mohawks cut Alter’s lead to 32-21 at halftime.
The Knights talked at halftime about not settling so soon for 3-pointers. In the second half, they reversed the ball more, found Moody on some curls to the ball for layups and found more perimeter shots in rhythm.
Versailles 53, Waynesville 47: Tim Gabbard’s team gained control with an explosive, up-and-down-the-court 16-5 run to close the third quarter. But the Spartans’ 43-38 lead didn’t last.
Versailles (17-7) regrouped, shut down the Spartans (241) and scored enough to make another trip to districts where they will face Norwood (18-6) on Saturday at Springfield.
Gabbard’s second unbeaten season in 44 years came to an abrupt ending against a team the Spartans defeated 47-40 on December 30.
“We got that lead and we thought we were all right,” he said. “And then we kept throwing the ball away. We knew it was going to be even, and whoever made the most turnovers was going to lose the game.”
Versailles’ size took its toll on Waynesville, holding Katie Berrey to 13 points and Maggie Stephenson to 11. Versailles countered with 14 points from guard Jenna Dirksen and 14 and 12, respectively, from guard Katey Litten and forward Taylor Wagner.
The Tigers led most of the first half, beating Waynesville’s press and getting shots they wanted. A late 8-2 run by the Spartans cut Versailles’ lead to 26-25 at halftime. Gabbard went to a half-court matchup defense in the second half and surged to the lead. Then Versailles turned the game in their favor in the fourth quarter.
“We came together at the end of the quarter and I just said let’s relax,” Versailles coach Tracy White said. “We’ve done this for a week, we’ve worked against this pressure, we’ve done all of these things. There’s nothing that you haven’t seen before. They just got their run. Now it’s time to get ours.”