Tribe hangs on for sectional title

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COLDWATER, Ohio — When the Indians took shots in the first quarter they seemed to go in.

When the Thunderbirds weren't committing turnovers, they couldn't buy a bucket.

Had it gone any other way the Indians might not have been able to hang on.

Fort Recovery High School's girls basketball team jumped out to a 14-3 lead after the first quarter and had to hold off the Lima Central Catholic Thunderbirds for a 38-34 win in the Division IV Wapakoneta District sectional final on Saturday night at The Palace in Coldwater.

“Normally when our defense is good in games early we struggle to score,” said FRHS coach Brian Patch, whose team advances to the district semifinal at 8 p.m. Thursday against defending state champion Minster. The second-ranked Wildcats dominated Waynesfield-Goshen 58-20 in the other sectional final Saturday night.

“We jumped on them,” Patch added. “Then after that we just kind of struggled.”

Fort Recovery (12-11), which is the No. 5 seed, used a stretch of 14 consecutive points in the opening quarter to build its massive lead.

Val Muhlenkamp, who had a game-high 14 points, hit a jumper from the left elbow to begin the run, then Olivia Patch put back a Alli Vaughn miss for two points. Muhlenkamp, Kierra Wendel and Vaughn each got baskets to push the advantage to 10-1 before a Muhlenkamp put-back and a Vaughn jumper.

Vaughn joined Muhlenkamp in double figures with 10 points, and Wendel tossed in eight points. Muhlenkamp also hauled in eight rebounds. LCC's Rosie Williams led all players with a dozen boards.

During that stretch, No. 7 seed LCC (11-12) committed five turnovers, missed three shots and had another one blocked by Patch. The T-Birds finally stopped the run when Mary Mulcahy sank a pair of foul shots with less than a minute to play, more than six minutes since LCC's first point.

Fort Recovery, which led 20-11 at halftime and 26-15 at the end of the third quarter, started getting away from deliberately moving the basketball during the fourth quarter and instead took quick shots on its possessions.

“I thought we rushed some things,” Patch said. “They switched to a zone. We took some quick shots, didn't get the ball movement that we had.

“Not that they were bad shots, they were quick shots.”

The Indians were just 1-of-6 from the field in the final eight minutes, all the while the Thunderbirds were able to continue to chip away. Hannah Graver — her nine points shared the team high with Erin Mulcahy — hit a 3-pointer in the final minute to get LCC to within two possessions, 34-29.

Fort Recovery didn't take a foul shot until the fourth quarter, and they finished 10-of-16 from the stripe.

“We got our stops I guess when we needed to,” Patch said. “Hit some free throws down the stretch.

“Wasn't pretty but we'll take it.”

Against Minster on Thursday, Patch said his team has to focus on controlling the ball and limiting turnovers against the Wildcats (23-1), the district's top seed.

“We didn't play very well at their place,” Patch said of Minster's 54-24 win on Jan. 3. I thought we played kind of scared against them.

“Obviously we can't play that way against them. We have to come out and take care of the basketball, which we didn't do the first time.

“I thought our defense was OK. Not great, but OK. We'll have to go back through and look at that film, see what we did well and what we didn't do well and make some changes.”