Shelbyville Lady Golden Bears Basketball

Sports Monday, February 05, 2001 Last Updated: Monday, February 05, 2001 at 12:51 PM Lady Bears aren’t afraid of Arlington By JEFF BROWN Monday, February 05, 2001 at 4:01 PM INDIANAPOLIS — Indianapolis Arlington is an intimidating looking team during pre-game warmups. And for one quarter Saturday, they were just plain intimidating the Shelbyville Golden Bears. But Shelbyville’s girls’ basketball coach John Fair kept telling his team, “It’s just a matter of time.” He hoped. Because when Arlington’s Natalie Johnson scored with four minutes, 48 seconds left in the second quarter, the score was tied, 30-30. Finally, though, Shelbyville’s talent and depth took over the game. The Golden Bears closed the quarter with an impressive 23-3 scoring run. They followed that with an 18-8 scoring advantage in the third quarter and settled for an 85-55 win. With a different starting lineup and two meaningless games in terms of conference titles left on the schedule, Fair was able to experiment with some new facets the Golden Bears may utilize in the sectional. With senior Jenni Ross dealing with a sore knee, Fair turned to freshman Gwen Haehl to start. And with the sheer size of the Lady Golden Knights, Fair went with freshman center Haley Wise in the starting lineup as well. For the first time this year, Shelbyville started three freshmen and a sophomore along with senior Sarah Laird. And with such a young squad on the floor, Fair believed anxious energy had a lot to do with the way the team started. “We had two kids out there that had never started before and I thought they were a little nervous,” said Fair. “But we knew it would just be a matter of time. Arlington played hard but we sustained and came away with a nice victory." Early in the game, it took the hot shooting hand of Laird to keep the Golden Bears in the game. She hit a 3-pointer at the 5:44 mark in the first quarter for Shelbyville’s first points of the game. Two minutes later, Laird hit another 3-pointer that tied the score at 12-12. In the second quarter, Laird hit back-to-back 3-pointers that once again tied the score at 28-28 and set the Golden Bears up for their scoring outburst. Laird would finish with a team-high 16 points, all scored in the first half. Fair tried to limit her playing time in the second half due to a sore calf muscle that has been bothering Laird. Three other Golden Bears scored in double figures as well. Allison Berger came off the bench to score a season-high 14 points. Ashley Matney, another Golden Bear fighting nagging injuries, also came off the bench and scored 12 points. Douglas scored 11 points. Ashley Coy led the Golden Bears with five rebounds. Natalie Johnson and Erica Sharp each scored 12 to lead Arlington. Shanda Smith had a game-high 10 rebounds while 6-foot-3 Katina Smith had eight of Arlington’s 11 blocked shots in the game. Shelbyville will finish its regular season tomorrow at Morristown.