Shelbyville Lady Golden Bears Basketball

Shelbyville remains calm as Warriors’ late rally falls short By Ross Flint Staff writer Published: Saturday, January 25, 2014 8:05 AM US/eastern If there’s one thing the Shelbyville girls’ basketball team can be confident in with the state tournament less than a month away, it is this: The Golden Bears know how to come through in the clutch. The Golden Bears won another close ball game Thursday, beating Whiteland 47-44, for their fifth “fourth-quarter win” of the season, coach Scott Larrabee said. Shelbyville (6-11) held off a late charge by the Warriors, knocking down three key free throws in the final 45 seconds. Freshman Alexis Tackett gave the Golden Bears a 44-37 lead with a drive to the hoop with 4:02 remaining in the game, but the Warriors (1-14) made a run to pull within one. * Kaylee McCracken made a pair of free throws and Monica Wagner made 1-of-2. Wagner got a putback to go with 2:38 remaining and the Golden Bears turned the ball over with 1:55 remaining when Tackett took her eye off the ball and the pass deflected off her hands and out of bounds. Sidney Crowe cut Shelbyville’s lead to one, 44-43, with 1:41 remaining on a layup. But the Golden Bears knocked down big free throws down the stretch, starting with one by senior Riley Achenbach, which made it a two-point lead. Sammi Fancher made 1-of-2 free throws with 28 seconds left, making it 45-44, but Shelbyville sophomore Morgan Parker made it a two-point lead again with a free throw with 11 seconds left. Even though she had a look, Fancher tried to make an extra pass from the baseline about three feet from the hoop, only for the ball to go out of bounds with three seconds left, and another free throw from Allyson Conner gave the Golden Bears the three-point win. “It was a game of runs,” Larrabee said. “We got a little passive and they stayed aggressive and were able to cut into the lead. I was really proud of our girls, there at the end, to be able to switch modes and we started attacking and knocked down free throws. (It) shows growth in our ball club to win another close game like this.” The Golden Bears led by as many as 10 in the fourth quarter in large part to finding their shooting touch in the third quarter. Shelbyville, which had shot 30 percent from the field in the first half, shot 54 percent in the third quarter in taking a 36-29 lead. After finding themselves down 21-19 at the half, Larrabee reassured his team that it would find its scoring touch, and it did. Sophomore Cassady Skipton, who didn’t take a shot in the first half, tied the game 15 seconds into the second half with a layup, and after Kate White knocked down a 3-pointer from the corner, Skipton cut the deficit to 24-23. Tackett’s field goal gave the Golden Bears the lead 11?2 minutes into the half. Achenbach’s fast-break layup made it 27-24, but Crowe tied it with a three. Achenbach gave the Golden Bears the lead for good with a 3-pointer of her own, and Parker made 1-of-2 free throws for a 31-27 lead with 4:44 remaining. Conner’s baseline shot gave Shelbyville a 33-27 lead with 1:50 remaining and after a layup by Crowe, Achenbach beat the buzzer with a 3-pointer for the seven-point lead. “We felt like we were getting good looks in the first half and they weren’t going down,” Larrabee said. “We just kept telling the girls ‘Forward thinking, forward thinking,’ and they started falling.” Shelbyville did a good job rebounding the ball, finishing with a 34-22 advantage. “We did a nice job,” Larrabee said. “They were in that 1-2-2 (defense) and we did a nice job crashing the offensive glass and certainly was a big part of the win tonight.”