Owensboro advanced to the second round of the regional tournament after they had a comfortable 58-40 win over Butler County. A strong defensive effort from the Lady Red Devils allowed them to steadily build their lead until they had the game all but closed out by halftime.
Butler scored first to open the game with a bucket under the rim. They then made a three pointer to take a 5-0 lead. This would be the largest lead held by Butler as Shalyn Sprinkles got a steal and opened herself up for a three to put OHS on the scoreboard. Owenbsoro’s defense took over from this point on as Unique Carter-Swanagan stole the ball on the next possession, but OHS could not capitalize.
Despite forcing many turnovers throughout the game, Lady Red Devils head coach Jansen Locher said that the team didn’t do as well as they could have on turning turnovers into points.
“I feel like early on we didn’t get as many baskets out of their turnovers as we wanted to,” he said. “Once we did Shalyn got things going. Unique does a heck of a job on point guards all throughout the region and the state. Once we were able to control them, we were a little too aggressive early. We went for steals we didn’t get that led to some baskets. We fouled too much early on and they got a lot of free throws. Once we settled down and played our Lady Devils defense and good things happened.”
Keeley Harris drove into the lane and drew a foul on her bucket. She converted the and-1 play to take the lead at 6-5. OHS ended the quarter leading 12-7. The second quarter saw Owensboro run away the lead thanks to their tight defense made getting up the court difficult for Butler. Carter-Swanagan and Hughes both got steals that led to contested layups to take their lead to 19-10. Owensboro also dominated the rebounding game as multiple players fought hard for rebounds on both ends of the court to stop Butler in their tracks and for some easy second-chance points as well. Owensboro’s defensive play allowed them to extend their lead to 32-21 by halftime.
Hughes kept the tempo going for OHS in the third quarter as she stole the ball off an inbound pass and rebounded her own missed shot for a second chance bucket. Hughes kept up her efforts as she hustled for a loose ball and assisted on a layup by Gizelle Whitlock. Sprinkles ended the third quarter in fashion as she hit a three pointer at the buzzer to put the score at 52-27. They closed out the fourth quarter with 6 more points to put the final score at 58-40.
Hughes and Sprinkles both had 16 points to lead the Lady Red Devils in scoring. Sprinkles made 4 threes and Hughes shot 6 of 8 from the free throw line. Locher was proud of the team’s performance, and he felt the team never lost control of the game. He said he was worried about the team being lackluster compared to their previous high-intensity district championship game, but he can’t complain with a double digit victory.
“I think our mindset was good,” he said. “Our last game was such an intense game, and it was an anticipated game that everybody wanted. I was worried about being a little lackluster tonight. I feel like we were at times, but again you can’t ask for much more than a double digit win. We kept our cool. I don’t think we ever lost control of the game. We were in control the whole time and that’s what you ask for in these games.”
The Lady Red Devils will play against Breckinridge County in the semifinals on March 8 at 6 p.m. at the Sportscenter.
