Portagers fall short against Cougars

Manistee News Advocate, Feb. 5, 2013
Posted by Martin Slagter

BIG RAPIDS — It wasn’t pretty — particularly in the second half — but Crossroads Charter Academy came up with enough plays down the stretch in a 43-35 win over Onekama on Tuesday.

Leading by 13 points at the half, the Cougars (14-1, 10-1) couldn’t find any rhythm offensively and began to turn the ball over, letting the Portagers get within 36-34 with about three minutes remaining in the game. A big jumper by Malory Carlson and a critical steal and finish at the rim by Kaela Brooks helped CCA get the lead back up to 40-34 to secure the win.

Crossroads coach J.J. Eads said he wasn’t pleased with his team’s performance in the second half, but the Cougars were able to make enough plays to pick up a big league win.

“It was a frustrating second half,” he said. “Normally, we’re a second half team. We were still getting stops, but we just didn’t take care of the ball and we were forcing it.”

After scoring just 13 points in the first half, the Portagers began to chip away at the lead, thanks to a gutsy performance from Alexis Tribfelner, who led the team with 15 points.

“We usually count on her to be a spark plug for us,” Onekama coach Nathan Bradford said of Tribfelner. “She’s a vocal leader and comes out and gives 100 percent. When she’s going it gets the other girls going and picks them up. It was probably her best game of the year.”

The Portagers had their chances to steal a big league game on the road, Bradford said, but the early hole might have been too much to overcome.

“I thought when we got down two, we had a couple shots at the basket,” he said. “But we dug a pretty big hole and it’s hard to battle back from that. I give the girls credit, they played hard and didn’t quit.”

CCA built up its first half lead behind solid defense and an aggressive effort on the glass. The Cougars were led by a pair of strong performances from Carlson (12 points, 13 rebounds) and Alyssa Larson (9 points, 11 rebounds), who controlled the boards throughout. CCA owned a 37-24 rebounding advantage.

Onekama’s Caitlin Zielinski (14) and Kayla Kosiboski (30) defend Crossroads’ Alyssa Larson during Tuesday’s game. (Martin Slagter/Pioneer News Network)

“That’s the first thing I wrote on the board in our pregame was to rebound the ball,” Eads said. “We’re usually not bigger than other teams, but Onekama is a lot like us, so I thought if we won the rebounding margin we’d be OK, and it looks like we did that.”

Carlson said rebounding was a big part of her team’s success on Tuesday.

“We started playing pretty good in the first half,” she said. “(Rebounding) was one of our little challenges and we did a pretty good job of that.”

Crossroads took a 10-2 lead early following a jumper by Aubrielle Angel and a putback by Carlson.

The lead grew in the second quarter following a big putback with two seconds remaining in the half by Larson to make it 26-13 at intermission.

Tribfelner hit a jumper to cut it to 26-18 with 5:55 left in the third quarter. After a triple by Katlin Reed increased CCA’s lead to 29-18, Tawny Kott hit a jumper to make it 31-26 with 38 seconds left in the quarter. A putback by Tribfelner cut it to 33-28 going into the fourth quarter.

Possessing a 38-34 lead with less than a minute to go, Onekama had the ball with a chance to cut into the lead, but the steal by Brooks gave the Cougars momentum and put the game out of reach.

   
   
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