Fort beats Celina

FORT RECOVERY - Grace Thien missed her first six 3-point attempts on Tuesday night.

She didn't miss many after.

Thien finished 5-of-12 from long range and scored a game-high 21 points, leading the Indians past the visiting Celina Bulldogs 63-40 at Fort Site Fieldhouse.

"She had some great looks in the first quarter, too, and just missed some of them," Fort Recovery coach Brian Patch said. "Then we ran an out-of-bounds play for her. She saw it go through the hoop. I think that helped her out confidencewise. She hit the last 3 to end the half and she didn't miss too many shots from then on."

Val Muhlenkamp pitched in a season-high 17 points and Carley Stone netted 17 as well for the Indians, who improved to 16-4.

Lauren Jackson and Emily Braun scored 11 apiece for the Bulldogs (2-19), who shot the ball well in the second half but couldn't overcome a big first-half deficit.

"I wish we would have played the first half like we did in the second. It was great," said Celina varsity assistant Kylee Bader, filling in for head coach Brandon Steinke. "I don't know what it was, but I was glad to see us try to fight back and get back in it."

Stone scored eight points in the first quarter, and Thien and Muhlenkamp added four apiece as the Indians built a 16-2 lead by the end of the first quarter, forcing seven Celina turnovers in the process.

The second quarter was much closer, but the Bulldogs couldn't get the deficit smaller than 11. Muhlenkamp scored six more points for Fort Recovery and Thien contributed five - including a last-second 3-pointer that broke a 10-all tie in the quarter to make the score 29-12 at halftime.

The teams scored a combined 42 points in the third quarter (23 for Fort Recovery and 19 for Celina) and eight 3-pointers. Thien knocked down four 3s and Muhlenkamp surpassed her season-high 15 points with an additional seven points. Jackson had a seven-point quarter for Celina and Carley Eichler added four.

"I would say our best quarter was the third quarter," Bader said. "It was nice to see everyone trying to score and not just one person. It was a great team effort. We did the best we could."

Brooke Robbins and Braun hit back-to-back 3s for Celina to open the third, cutting the lead to 16. But the score never got closer.

"Since we've had struggles every now and then (offensively), it's the idea of trying to get a good shot every single time, so we know we have a better chance of hitting those," Patch said. "It's nice to come out and put 63 on the board. The other part that I didn't really like was the 40 on the other side. Our defense wasn't very good. Our focus wasn't there like we needed it to be. We're going to have to supply better energy on Thursday."

The eighth-ranked host fourth-ranked Minster in MAC action on Thursday.

The Bulldogs return to WBL competition, traveling to Van Wert.