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02-17-04: Flyers fall short on road at Fort Loramie

By GARY R. RASBERRY
grasberry@dailystandard.com

FORT LORAMIE — Marion Local nearly shrugged off a slow start, but in the end could not overcome a strong Fort Loramie team in losing 59-51 at Fort Loramie on Monday evening. The loss puts the Flyers at 15-4 on the season as the Redskins end the regular season at 17-3, with two of the three losses coming to Midwest Athletic Conference schools.
The very physical game, resulting in 42 total personal fouls and three players fouling out, made for a long evening with extended periods of time at the foul line. The teams combined for 60 free-throw attempts in the game, with both teams shooting well, making 70 percent of the tries.
The Redskins opened up with a strong start as Marion went scoreless for the first half of the opening stanza. Redskin Abbie Ernst, the lone senior for coach Carla Siegel, hit three of her first four field goals as the Flyers were trying to keep tabs on the sophomore tandem of Mallory Albers and Courtney Reed. Marion was down 6-0 before scoring and trailed 14-6 before getting a late run to cut the lead to five at 16-11 at the end of the quarter.
“We came out a little flat and they came out hot,” said Flyer coach Treva Fortkamp. “We didn’t have an answer for Ernst and we had to make an adjustment.”
The adjustments slowed down Ernst, but the Flyers were unable to make any dent on the deficit they were in. The Flyers’ own super-sophomore, Maria Moeller, did her best, coming up several acrobatic drives down the lane to score while getting fouled. Moeller had 10 points by the halftime break. Fort Loramie, though kept the pace and led 28-23 at halftime.
Marion came back in the third quarter and started with a 9-4 run that gave the Flyers their only tie of the game at 32-all with 3:54 left in the period.
The Flyers never could get over the hump as Fort Loramie countered with a 7-0 run thanks in part to sophomore center Leslie Hoelscher, who hit back-to-back buckets to ignite the run. Loramie also got some help from the Flyers as Fortkamp was hit with a technical foul for disagreeing with a play during the run.
Fort Loramie stayed strong until late in the fourth quarter, holding a 52-43 lead with 2:29 left. The Flyers, even with Moeller sidelined with three minutes left after picking up her fifth foul, staged one last try to get back into the game.
Kelli Stucke, who replaced Moeller, did her part with three big free throws over two trips to the line. With less than a minute left the Flyers cut the lead to 55-51 before Albers and Reed each hit free throws to get to the final score.
“Every time we got close or got even, something happened,” said Fortkamp. “It’s like trying to climb a mountain, then you hit something and fly back down. I thought the girls played hard. We worked on crashing the boards and rebounding.
“It’s a tough loss, but we can’t stay here and hang our heads when we come back to play in less than 24 hours.”
“It was a tough battle,” said Siegel. “I was pleased how our younger girls (Fort Loramie played at times with four sophomores on the court) handled the pressure in a game like this and getting ready for tournament.”
Ernst shined in her home finale, leading all scorers with 23 points, thanks in part to 10-of-10 foul shooting. Reed added 14 with Albers and Hoelscher chipping in with 10 each.
Moeller led Marion with 20 points while Jenna Barhorst added eight.
Marion Local wraps up the regular season tonight at St. Marys.

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