For the Daily Journal
Trinity Lutheran played a nearly perfect opening quarter and rode that momentum to an easy 82-32 win at Edinburgh on Thursday in girls basketball.
The Cougars, ranked eighth in Class A, forced turnovers on Edinburgh’s first six possessions, scored 20 of the first 23 points and led 31-12 after the first quarter in an impressive all-around performance.
“Honestly, I think we set a new school record for points in a quarter,” Trinity coach Mike Lang said.
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Trinity (6-1) used its full-court press to devastating effect in the opening frame. Each of Edinburgh’s first five possessions ended in Cougars steals, and on the sixth, the Lancers threw the ball away.
Trinity made the most of the gifts and scored in a variety of ways. Post players Abby Hackman and Sydney Jaynes tortured the smaller Lancers inside and the Cougars bombed four 3-pointers during the opening stanza. And of course there were plenty of buckets in transition off steals thanks to 13 Edinburgh turnovers.
It wasn’t the type of start Edinburgh coach Amy Schilling was hoping for.
“Mentally, we were just out of it,” Schilling said. “When we got in the hole, we just quit doing what we were doing. You can’t win anything with that many turnovers, and they quickly turned those turnovers into points.”
Despite the lopsided score, Schilling was pleased with the way her team fought, pulling as close as 17 early in the third. But as hard as the Lancers played, they still didn’t do the things that they needed to do in order to win.
“We’ve got to be mentally stronger and just take care of the ball,” Schilling said. “Today we didn’t play anywhere near our level of play. … They had intensity on defense and they’re long and lanky and athletic, and that bothered us.”
Destiney Ramey led the Lancers with 13 points.
