Aberdeen and Tumwater’s girls played each other closely for three quarters. But an avalanche of turnovers in the third quarter buried the Bobcats’ chances in their 51-38 home loss to Tumwater in an Evergreen 2A Conference girls basketball opener Tuesday at Sam Benn Gym
Aberdeen (0-1,1-10) had trouble penetrating Tumwater’s 2-3 zone and could not get passes into Bobcats who were cutting into towards the basket.
With passes being picked off, the Thunderbirds wasted no time jump-starting their offense and getting transition buckets.
With Aberdeen afflicted by a high number of turnovers and a shooting touch that had gone cold, Tumwater scored 16 successive points to blow the game wide open after protecting a slim one-point lead at the end of the second quarter.
Aberdeen head coach John Yonich said his team struggled to adjust after Tumwater spread out its zone defense in the second half.
“They were in zone the whole game but they stretched it out on us a little bit. We have plays and reactions to use against that and they didn’t work,” he said. “Its not that it won’t work, because it has worked, but when the waves started coming in, we didn’t know how to handle it.”
The third-quarter collapse put the Bobcats out of striking distance but Aberdeen tried its best to make the game close in the fourth.
Instead of relying on cutters that allowed Aberdeen to get some momentum on offense in the first half, Aberdeen moved the ball more around the perimeter and allowed some of its best players to score on iso plays when opportunities did not present themselves.
Reagan Glanz converted on some difficult shots despite getting a lot of attention from Tumwater’s defense and came away with 16 points.
Angel Jones did most of her work from outside the paint and came away with 14 points, relying on her mid-range jumper.
Yonich said he liked what his team showed him in the fourth quarter after a disastrous third quarter.
“I’ll give the girls credit. They put their foot down when we were down by more than 20,” he said. “We came back and we knocked it down to 10 points and I think that shows something. They could have packedit in but they didn’t.”
Aberdeen will host Black Hills on Thursday. The schedule doesn’t get any easier as the Bobcats will have to face powerful Chehalis on Jan. 10.
Yonich still believes his team can qualify for the postseason despite dropping their first league game at home.
“We know what position we’re fight to get to and this is one of the wins that we needed,” he said. “We know the wins we need and we know the ones we’d be happy to have but I still think we can get there.”
Tumwater 11 10 22 8 — 51
Aberdeen 10 10 4 14 — 38
Tumwater (51) — Koelsch 14, Cunningham 6, Fields 18, Vessey, Hampstead 2, Geathers 4, Jelcick 3, Borovec 4. FG— 21-64 (.328). FT— 3-6.
Aberdeen (38) — Orona 2, Glanz 16, Walsh, Pruett, Heikkila, Tageant 6, Jones 14. FG — 14-53 (.264) FT— 9-19.
