Coldwater starts fast to beat New Knoxville

NEW KNOXVILLE - Coldwater grabbed the momentum early and never gave it up as the Lady Cavaliers picked up their first Midwest Athletic Conference win of the season, 55-36 over New Knoxville Thursday night at the Barn.

Coldwater hit six of its first eight shots from the floor to open up a seven-point lead midway through the first quarter and then used an active zone defense to pull away in the second quarter.

The early lead seemed to suck the life out of the Rangers and their gym.

"It's huge," Coldwater coach Connie May said of getting out to an early lead at the Barn. "It's huge because this is New Knoxville and this place can take the wind out of you."

Trailing 15-11 after the first eight minutes, New Knoxville was held without a field goal for the first four minutes of the second quarter as the Cavaliers went on a 10-1 run to open up a 25-12 advantage.

The Rangers appeared to struggle at times to find a way to attack Coldwater's defense.

"I knew they were going to throw that 1-2-2 zone on us," New Knoxville coach Tim Hegemier said. "We worked on it in practice, showed the girls what to do, but it didn't sink in. It's just youth and not enough basketball skills."

May said movement and active hands are the keys to making her defense come alive.

"We're starting to get more active in that zone and the girls are figuring out that's what's been helping us get going," May said. "The activity of our hands is the key with Maura Hoying, Kourtney Diller, and Laura Gilliland getting deflections. We've got a lot of length and that really helps us in that zone as long as we keep our hands moving."

Another factor in Coldwater's 33-18 halftime lead was a 15-5 edge on the boards in the second quarter, including several offensive stickbacks for the Cavs.

"I talked about that before the game," Hegemier said. "You can't give this team two and three shots or you're going to be in big trouble. They killed us on the boards in the first half."

The Cavaliers were able to track down several loose ball rebounds -- a hustling effort that May said wasn't there earlier in the season.

"We tell our girls about 50-50 balls all the time because we were really struggling with those in our first four or five games of the season," she said. "We weren't getting any 50-50 balls, but they really went after them tonight. I thought the girls did a great job."

New Knoxville turned the ball over five times in the first 3 1/2 minutes of the second half. Diller scored the Cavs' first six points of the third quarter to help Coldwater open up a 41-21 lead.

The Rangers did make a run spanning the third and fourth quarters to reduce a 20-point deficit to 10, 44-34, with six minutes left in the game.

However, the Cavaliers responded with a 9-0 run to put the game on ice.

"We ran out of gas, and it starts affecting our shot," Hegemier said. "If we don't get a bunny shot, it's probably not going to go in."

The Rangers were 1-of-11 behind the arc and were led in scoring by Megan Jurosic with 10 points.

Coldwater had a big game from Gilliland, who pulled down 15 rebounds and shared game-high scoring honors with Diller with 15 points each.

Coldwater, now 1-3 in the MAC and 6-6 overall, travels to Lima Central Catholic on Tuesday and plays host to Parkway next Thursday.

New Knoxville fell to 0-3 in the MAC and 4-9 overall. The Rangers have a busy week, traveling to Lehman on Saturday, hosting Waynesfield-Goshen on Tuesday and then travelling next Thursday for a MAC battle at Delphos St. John's.