Deer Lakes girls walk over Riverview in St. Joseph tournament

By: HSSN Staff
Thursday, December 28, 2017 | 11:59 PM

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For a team like Deer Lakes, which has struggled against some of the bigger schools on its nonsection schedule, the holiday tourney season couldn't have come at a better time.

Those early-season struggles seemed to be a thing of the past as the girls basketball team used an aggressive defense to take control early and roll past Riverview, 60-20, in the opening round of St. Joseph's holiday tournament.

“Over this holiday break is a perfect opportunity to start working on and incorporating some new things that we've been trying to instill,” Deer Lakes coach David Petruska said. “Our offense, against a man-to-man, is different compared to what we've done in the past, and this is just a great opportunity to further explain it and make sure they understand it as we move forward.”

Deer Lakes (2-5) advanced to the tournament championship and will play St. Joseph at 6:30 p.m. on Friday. Riverview will play Brashear in the consolation game at 3.

“I don't know where their heads were, that's what's most disappointing,” Riverview coach Keith Stitt said. “We had a game earlier in the year (against Shady Side Academy), and we got beat pretty good. I kind of felt that we weren't mentally ready to play, and it was the same thing today and it kind of bothers me.”

Riverview (3-4) started strong and built a 4-1 lead with baskets from Alivia Schutheis and Alyssa Cappa. But that was the high point for the Raiders. Deer Lakes responded with a 15-2 run to close the first quarter with a 16-6 lead.

Cappa finished with nine points to lead the Raiders.

“Something I've been hitting hard with them is taking care of every possession that we have,” Petruska said. “In our first five games we've been pretty lazy with the ball, and our main focus going into tonight was to take care of every possession that we have.”

While Deer Lakes began to find itself on the offensive end, it was the defense that provided opportunities. The Lancers came out in the second quarter and held the Raiders to just six points while Eva Sipko, Anna Solomon and Abby Buechel helped pace the Deer Lakes offense to a 14-point second quarter.

Solomon finished with a game-high 10 points, and Julia Hollibaugh chipped in with nine to lead the Lancers.

“I think we had six rebounds where we were stripped of the ball, and (Deer Lakes) turned around and got a bucket out of it,” Stitt said. “We're not good enough that we can afford to give buckets away like that.”

Deer Lakes continued to smother Riverview ball-handlers in the second half, holding the Raiders without a basket the entire third quarter. Riverview's only points of the third quarter came on free throws by Cappa and Schutheis.

“We've been working on causing and creating turnovers, but it's been what we've done after getting the ball back in our hands that I've been really nervous about,” Petruska said. “Today their transition was a lot better.”

The Lancers' offense was in cruise control for most of the second half, and it became increasingly obvious the Deer Lakes offense grew confident with each trip down the floor. Victoria Kiebler drained a 3-pointer to extend the Lancers lead to 35-12, and the team went into the fourth quarter on an 8-2 run.

Cappa drained a 3-pointer early in the fourth quarter to end the dry spell to bring the score to 54-18, and McKenzie Smail added a basket with 2 minutes, 21 seconds remaining to close out Riverview's scoring.

“It's definitely a good ending, and hopefully (Friday) will be a good ending to this year,” Petruska said.

William Whalen is a freelance writer.

Tags: Deer Lakes, Riverview