PREP ROUNDUP: Pioneer girls finish runner-up at IKHC

6 days ago 2

The Pioneer girls basketball team had a good showing at the Indiana Kitchen Holiday Classic at Delphi over the weekend, punctuated by a rematch with Rossville for the championship game.

The Hornets avenged an overtime loss from a year ago with a 53-40 win over the Panthers to claim the championship.

Freshman Mallory O’Brien scored 18 points to lead Rossville (14-11). Ava Burkle had 15 points and 10 rebounds and Allie Elliott was also in double figures with 10 points.

Mia McKaig scored 20 points to lead the Panthers (5-10). Lois Layer and Avery Haselby added six apiece and Leah Zeigler chipped in four.

The Hornets beat Winamac by 14 in a semifinal game. Their only loss of the season was to Lewis Cass on Dec. 9.

“They’ve got everybody back plus they have a point guard now that they didn’t have last year that’s extremely good,” Pioneer coach David McWherter said. “They’re an extremely good team. I will not be surprised if they end the year 22-1. I do not see another loss on their schedule the rest of the year. I think Clinton Central’s probably the next best team that plays them the rest of the year. So to lose to them and only lose by 13, but being down six halfway through the fourth quarter to a team that’s gonna end the year 22-1, obviously we’ve made some improvements here over the last week or so.”

McKaig continues to lead the Panthers and she and Haselby were named to the all-tournament team. McKaig also received the Sportsmanship Award.

McWherter said McKaig was close to having a triple-double against Taylor on Friday when the stats will be tabulated.

“In the Taylor game she only had 13 points but she easily had 10 rebounds and close to 10 assists because just the way they were playing her it made it so much easier,” he said. “Delphi went basically face guarded her and she still puts up what 21 points when they’re face guarding her. She just has changed her game and has become our Makenna Strycker this year for us the way she creates for herself and everything. She’s just very smart player.

“Her ball handling’s gotten so much better from last year. Her decision making’s gotten so much better and she’s not the fastest girl on the court, but she sure is one of the smartest. She can create off the dribble.”

Pioneer beat Taylor 66-16 and Delphi 56-54 Friday. Haselby scored 24 and made six 3-pointers against Taylor and scored 13 more against Delphi.

“I thought we played extremely well for playing two games in one day,” McWherter said. “I didn’t think necessarily that would be our forte or something that we could possibly do, but we Friday evening I thought we played extremely well. We had a couple girls that really stepped up in that Delphi game. Avery stepped up in the Taylor game. She stepped up and then in the game at Delphi, Mia really stepped up and hit some shots.

"Haselby stepped up to put us in the situation to be able to win that game late against Rossville in the championship game. We cut it down to six points midway through the fourth quarter and had an opportunity if we’d had a few more shots fall in here or there. But overall the six girls that always play for us played extremely well and then we had Mya Ott come in off the bench and gave us quality minutes both games there in the semifinal and the championship game.”

Pioneer travels to Frontier on Thursday.

WINAMAC PLACES 4TH

Delphi defeated Winamac 50-47 in the third-place game of the IKHC.

Freshman Ava Mills had 14 points and 10 rebounds to lead the Oracles (9-6). Aubrey Frost scored 11 points.

Kandace Kroft scored 20 points to lead the Warriors (11-5). Sadie Popejoy had 11 points and Marissa Iverson added five points and six boards.

Kroft scored 70 points in three games and was named to the all-tournament team. Iverson received the Sportsmanship Award.

Payton Morrow was named to the all-tournament team and Abby Brown received the Sportsmanship Award for Delphi.

Delphi travels to North White on Tuesday, while Winamac visits Knox on Tuesday.

TRITON 46, CASTON 41, OT

Caston (7-8, 4-2 HNAC) dropped a league game at Triton (5-8, 3-1) on Saturday night.

Madi Douglass had 22 points, 11 rebounds and five steals to lead the Comets. She hit what appeared to be the game-winning 3-pointer at the end of regulation but the officials ruled she stepped on the line which tied the game at 39 and it went into overtime. Caston outscored Triton 16-6 in the fourth quarter to force OT.

Grace Colvin added nine points and five assists for Caston, which travels to Western on Tuesday night.

Read Entire Article