What a difference a month can make. At the beginning of the new year (Jan. 5) Bellwood-Antis traveled to Alexandria to play the Juniata Valley girls. Although the Lady Blue Devils made a game of it through the first two and a half quarters, even taking a 36-34 lead with just over four minutes to play in the third quarter, the Lady Hornets outscored Bellwood-Antis 18-10 from that point on to register a 52-46 win on Senior Night.
On Monday night, Feb. 5, in the return match at Bellwood, a vastly improved Lady Blue Devil squad took the lead 10-9 on two free throws and a basket from Liz Erickson to close out the opening quarter.
That was the beginning of a run during which Juniata Valley never again got the lead, the Lady Blue Devils winning a 43-36 victory, a triumph in which they simply refused to give an inch. Anyone who had a doubt about that should have seen the fourth-quarter pick set by B-A junior Victoria Lombardo, which caused Valley’s three-point shooter Brittany Borst to leave the game and never come back.
Shalee Hunter opened the second quarter with a rebound and putback to up the B-A advantage to 12-9. Hunter would score 11 points and pull down 13 rebounds to go with a pair of steals in the first half on the way to another monster performance, finishing with a team-high 17 points and 19 rebounds. Liz Erickson added eight first-half points on the way to a game total of 13 and had 17 rebounds and three blocks. With the two big girls leading the way, the Bellwood-Antis girls rolled to a 27-16 first-half advantage.
“The key tonight was our defense,” said Bellwood-Antis coach Ali Stodart. “Our goal, coming out of the locker room to begin the game, was to put the pressure on them early, to make them press to score. And I think we executed our game plane very well. We played an excellent team defense, forcing them to make a lot of turnovers, unforced turnovers at times, to send the seniors off with a win.”
A Lauren Lender bucket and Brittany Webb foul shot gave the Lady Blue Devils their first lead, 6-5, early in the first quarter, after Juniata Valley jumped out to 3-0 and 5-3 leads.
In the third quarter, 1,000-point career scorer Desiree Reed tried to rally her team leading the Lady Hornets on an 8-2 run through much of the quarter, but Emily Derr buried a trey from the corner and Erickson threw in a short basket from the left side to finish the quarter losing just a single point of their lead. With just eight minutes to play, Bellwood-Antis still carried a 34-24 lead into the final stanza.
The Lady Blue Devils kept up the offensive pressure. Amanda Ingram nailed a trey to begin the fourth quarter to extend the B-A advantage to 37-24. Valley tried to press the B-A girls, in hopes of repeating the four-quarter victory like they had accomplished in the first contest between the two schools. This is a different Lady Blue Devil club however, one that refused to wilt. Liz Erickson hit two fouls shots and when the Juniata Valley defense collapsed on Liz, she fed Hunter for a pair of easy uncontested buckets to hold the lead at 11 points, until the Lady Hornets converted the final two baskets to draw to within six at the final buzzer.
“Shalee had an excellent game again tonight, another double-double,” explained Stodart. “She just keeps getting better. A lot of teams focus on Liz, and Shalee has been another force to be reckoned with in there. We had several other girls step in at critical times with big shots. Emily Derr had a huge three-pointer, and Amanda Ingram made a huge three-pointer, that together kind of changed the game, when Juniata Valley was trying to make a run to come back.
Lady Blue Devil seniors Shalee Hunter, Brittany Webb, Chelsea Young, Justine Savard and score keeper Sarah Bell were honored before the varsity game….Reed scored 19 points to lead all scorers, but Brittany Borst and Maddy Gildea, who each scored 12 points in the first game, were held to seven by Borst, and zero points by Gildea, who was in foul trouble for much of the game…Bellwood-Antis (7-14) will travel to West Branch on Thursday
Junior Varsity
The Bellwood-Antis junior varsity rebounded from a 22-17 deficit at halftime to tie the score 39-39 at the end of regulation to force an overtime period. Juniata Valley opened the extra stanza with five straight points and held on for a 45-42 win. Alycia Hippo led the B-A junior varsity with 12 points, while Brenna Taylor scored 11 points for Juniata Valley.
Bellwood-Antis 43 Juniata Valley 36
Juniata Valley- Keller 0 0-0 0, Borst 2 2-4 7, Gildea 0 0-0 0, Reed 9 1-2 19, Boyd 1 0-0 2, Morgan 1 0-3 2, McAllister 1 1-2 3, Taylor 0 0-0 0, Brenneman 1 1-4 3. TOTALS 15 5-15 36.
Bellwood-Antis – Ingram 1 0-0 3, Webb 0 1-2 1, Young 0 0-0 0, Lombardo 2 0-2 4, Lechner 0 0-0 0, Lender 1 0-0 2, E. Derr 1 0-0 3, Hunter 7 3-4 17, Erickson 4 4-6 13. TOTALS 16 8-14 43.
Juniata Valley 9 7 8 12 – 36
Bellwood-Antis 10 17 7 9 – 43
Three-point goals: Juniata Valley 1 (Borst)
Bellwood-Antis 3 (Ingram, E. Derr, Erickson)
