Unstoppable at home

Over the last decade, when teams saw the Patriots on their schedule, they knew they were in for a fight.

If they had to travel to Portland, the game would be all the tougher.

The South Adams Starfires had the displeasure of traveling to take on the Jay County High School basketball team that notched its 17th-straight win at home as it stomped SAHS 67-39 on Saturday.

The Patriots (11-2, 3-0 Allen County Athletic Conference) haven’t lost a home game since the 2022-23 home opener against Hamilton Heights on Nov. 12 when they lost 45-44 in overtime.

A strong first quarter was key to Jay County securing the victory.

“We came out ready to go,” JCHS coach Sherri McIntire said. “We had a great first quarter. …

This team’s really good at ‘Zorro’ and playing our half-court trap. We did a good job getting in passing lanes.”

The Patriots’ defense wrecked havoc for the Starfires’ offense, forcing 12 turnovers in the quarter while only allowing six shot attempts. South Adams (4-9, 1-2 ACAC) scored its first points with only 2 minutes, 56 seconds left in the period when Macy Pries hit a baseline runner.

Jay County already had 16 points by the time South Adams got on the board.

When the buzzer sounded, signaling the end of the quarter, the scoreboard read 28-4 in favor of the Patriots.

Hallie Schwieterman and Sophie Saxman had the most points in the quarter with eight. All of Schwieterman’s points came on transition layups, while Saxman had one transition bucket, two that came off of offensive rebounds and a final score that came off of a baseline out of bounds play.

Danielle May had six on a 3-pointer, a long-two and a free throw, Breanna Dirksen scored twice and Meredith Dirksen ended the run with a bucket off an offensive rebound in transition.

Meredith Dirksen of Jay County backs down Laney Trausch on Saturday night as the Patriots beat the Starfires 67-39. Dirksen hit three 3-pointers en route to a career-high 13 points. (The Commercial Review/Andrew Balko)

 

“I think it’s kind of been a little bit mental,” McIntire said. “She’s a perfectionist and wants to do well, which is good, but sometimes she’s pretty hard on herself. It’s good for her to come out and have a good game.”

Saxman and Meredith Dirksen both scored career-highs with 19 and 13 points respectively. 

Meredith Dirksen had a strong shooting day, draining three 3-point shots on five attempts.

This was Saxman’s third game in a row where she had double-figures, and the senior is now averaging 9.8 points per game, which is third on the team behind Schwieterman (13.8) and Muhlenkamp (11.6).

“It’s fun to score, but it’s not all that matters,” Saxman said. “We did a really good job sharing the ball tonight. It was fun. Right off the start, we were finding each other, just making good passes.”

Saxman finished with a double-double shooting 9-for-13 (69.2%), while ripping down 12 rebounds which led the Patriots. Of those 12 boards, nine came on the offensive glass. She also had a team-high six assists.

The lead gave Jay County the opportunity to put in different combinations of personnel to play different positions and practice man-to-man defense.

“We had a lead, so we worked on some things that we need to get better at,” McIntire said. “(Our man defense) isn’t where it needs to be by any means, but I feel like we’re probably better than what we played tonight.”

Once in the man defense, the Patriots struggled to stop Pries who was able to find seams in the defense. The SAHS senior scored a game-high 28 points on 10-for-16 (62.5%) from the field.

Of her 28 points, only eight came against the man defense, as she scored seven from the free throw line, six in transition, four against the 1-2-2 zone and three on a buzzer beater from near the volleyball line.

She drew at least five fouls on Jay County’s guards as well.

Outside of Pries, the Patriots man defense worked well for the first time it was used long-term in a live game.

“I thought it was a little rough in the beginning but I thought for being the first time that we played almost a full game with fans, I thought we executed pretty well,” said May. “We definitely have to be in help side. She split us a lot, so knowing where we are and watching our man in help side will help us not get split.”

The Patriots will get a break heading into the holiday before they look to extend their home win streak against Yorktown on Dec. 26.