Patriots fall to No. 3 Norwell

Friday night for the Patriots was foul trouble with a capital "T".

With Norwell on the line and several Patriots on the bench throughout the second half, the Class 3A No. 3 Knights were able to hand Jay County its second loss, 50-46.

"We're still trying to develop some depth and we got in some foul trouble," said Patriots coach Luke Cummings. "Good teams make you pay for some of those mistakes. I thought we had control of the game and played the game at the speed we wanted to and had control of it and then we got into foul trouble."

Jay County (4-2) got off to a good start, jumping out to an early 10-2 lead and then the foul trouble began as Norwell (4-0) began pounding the ball inside to its 6'2" center Jessica Rupright, who gave the Patriots headaches all night.

Rupright, who had 11 of her 17 points in the first half, drew fouls and warranted extra defenders around her as the Knights cut the Jay County lead to 20-19 at halftime.

"We really didn't do a good job even though (Pazia) Speed only had three points at halftime, we felt like she totally controlled the game for the first two quarters," said Norwell coach Eric Thornton. "Everything goes through her and she's so good. ... Defensively we had to establish what we wanted to do."

After the half, the Knights did just that, buckled down on defense and kept frustrating the Patriots with their offense.

The Knights also sent Speed to the bench for the most of the third quarter after she picked up her third foul early and was called for her fourth about midway through the quarter.

"It took the ballhandler out of the game and we want to have the ball in her hands so we can control the tempo of the game," Cummings said of Speed's foul trouble. "Katie Butcher, for not having to handling the ball as much did a really nice job and Erin Hunt played a really big game.

"We just didn't have enough, we are a young team ... and we're still trying to develop," he added. "And they exposed some of that."

Norwell took the lead 33-31 at the end of three and extended it out to as many as ten midway through the final period after hitting back to back three-pointers.

The Patriots tried to play catch up, but couldn't get closer than seven in the final minute, only cutting the final margin to four on a last second triple.

The Knights went to the line 28 times and made 19 of those attempts, which helped keep the Patriots at bay throughout the game.

Although the Patriots took their second loss in three games, Cumming was pleased with the offensive discipline his team showed, even though the shooting (39.5 percent) was spotty at times.

"I thought we did what we wanted to do," Cummings said. "We rushed it sometimes. We can't just come down and run up and down with a good team like this. We can't just throw shots up.

"I thought we were really disciplined in what we wanted to do but they hit key shots and we got down and then had to play a different way," he said.

Mariah Hornaday led the Patriot effort with 12 points, most of which came after offensive rebounds, and nabbed seven boards. Speed followed with eight points, six assists and five rebounds, and Hunt and Kassi Hemmelgarn each tacked on six points.

Rupright led Norwell with 17 points while Jenelle Wilson added 13 and Alyssa Smith 10.[[In-content Ad]]