St. Vincent girls basketball coach Melvin Kirn was bubbling over with excitement at just how well he believed his team had played.
He had good reason.
The Lady Indians defense held Advance scoreless for nearly 11 straight minutes and forced 21 turnovers as it rode the stifling defense to a 46-27 victory over the visiting Hornets on Tuesday.
“For the girls to get their first win and to do it in that fashion is great,” Kirn said. “I thought that we did a lot of things well and it showed on the scoreboard. I couldn’t be any more proud of the girls than I am right now.”
One of those good things that Kirn spoke of was St. Vincent’s ability to limit Advance junior Alandry Below. She averaged 25 points per game last year and scored 38 points and hauled in 20 rebounds just the previous night against Scott City.
The Indians held her below both of those figures as she scored 20 points on the night. St. Vincent was led by Mary Schwartz and Addie Cates with 12 points, while Lola Dauster had nine points. St. Vincent had seven players get tallies in the scorebook overall.
“Below is an awesome player and we knew that we would have to shut her down if we were going to have a chance,” Kirn said. “At halftime, they had 16 points and she had 13 of them, but in the second half we did a better job of collapsing in on her when she had the ball and made the other girls beat us.”
Below had just seven points after halftime, including going scoreless in the third quarter.
The Indians took advantage of that lull in the scoring and after ending the first half on a 10-0 run, Genevieve Lipe started the scoring with a driving layup, giving St. Vincent a 28-16 lead. Cates followed with a steal that was converted into a basket on the offensive end. Ashtin Fowler scored the first points for Advance in the second half with 1:35 left in the third quarter breaking their slump, that ended a 19-0 St. Vincent run that dated back to the second quarter. St. Vincent went on to outscore Advance 14-4 in the third.
St. Vincent continued that momentum in the fourth as Dauster and Schwartz hit back-to-back threes to put the game out of reach, if it wasn’t already.
I thought we did a good job of moving without the ball and we kept the ball moving from side to side all night,” Kirn said.
But it certainly didn’t look as if St. Vincent would run away and hide in the contest, if one was judging from the first half.
St. Vincent jumped out to a 5-0 lead after a steal and subsequent basket from Cates and Lipe found Lacey Best for a layup off a nice cut to the rim. Schwartz converted off a steal and Emerson Kirn had an offensive putback as St. Vincent led 16-7 after the opening quarter.
Advance had a run in them however, as they scored the first nine points of the second quarter to tie the game at 16-16 with five minutes before halftime. The Hornets were aided by four turnovers by St. Vincent in the first two minutes.
“We let them right back in the ball game,” Kirn said. “When we have a lead like that, we want to take our time and run the offense. I felt like we were in a hurry and that’s when the mistakes were made. But I’m glad to see we were able to bounce back in a good way.”
Schwartz broke the run with a pair of free throws and St. Vincent never trailed again and Advance would only score 11 more points in the contest.
For Kirn, it was his first varsity win at St. Vincent, but he knows he couldn’t have done it without his team.
“They are the ones on the court making plays out there,” Kirn said. “I’m very excited about the first win of my career, but at the same time I’m hoping for many more this season.”
St. Vincent will have to wait a while for their next chance at a victory as the Valle Tournament that was scheduled for Nov. 30 was cancelled. The next scheduled game for the Indians is at Fredericktown on Dec. 10.
