This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Sports

Oakville Girls Fall in First Round of MICDS Tournament

Parkway Central defeats the Tigers 39-35 in a defensive struggle Friday.

The Oakville girls basketball team was already the most inexperienced in the eight-team field in the MICDS Tournament, starting a pair of freshmen and a sophomore in their first round 39-35 loss to Parkway Central Friday.

But the young Tigers were even less experienced against the Colts as they were missing senior Lauren Fussell.

"Lauren's mom surprised her dad with a trip to Breckenridge for the holidays," Oakville coach Aaron Bosch said. "He has spent time in Colorado and likes to ski. She arranged the trip before Christmas because we had always played in the Lutheran South Tournament over the holidays and that was after Christmas."

Find out what's happening in Mehlville-Oakvillewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

But MICDS took over the Lutheran South tournament this year and had their first round of the tournament before Christmas. That meant that Fussell missed the first-round game and that might have been the difference in a tight, defensive-minded game.

"Lauren has the experience and has a calming effect on her teammates," Bosch said.

Find out what's happening in Mehlville-Oakvillewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Despite the youth and the abscense of Fussell, the sixth-seeded Tigers kept in the game against the third-seeded Colts.

Oakville got 3-pointers from one of the freshmen Sidney Thompson, along with Alex Perry and Maggie Pike in the first quarter, and had a 12-10 lead after the opening eight minutes.

Oakville extended its lead to 16-12 in the second quarter but went on a six-minute drought the rest of the half. Parkway Central scored the final 11 points of the quarter and lead 23-16 at halftime. The Colts took the lead for good on a rare four-point play by Taylor Kennedy to go up 18-16.

The Tigers would never regain the lead the rest of the way although they were able to cut the deficit to one possession on several occasions. A lot of that had to do with poor free throw shooting down the stretch by the Colts, who converted just three of 12 tries.

Thompson scored six of her nine points in the fourth quarter for the Tigers. She converted a lay-up on a pass from fellow freshman Alyssa Norberg to cut the Colt lead to 38-35 with 32 seconds left.

Kennedy missed two free throws with 30 seconds left but Thompson missed two of her own with 22 seconds left. Samantha Lewis finally hit one for the Colts with 11 seconds left for the clinching point.

"We have had a hard time scoring all year and are still trying to find a second scorer to Alyssa (Norberg)," Bosch said. "But I thought we played real hard on defense and did a good job with our rotations.

"This is such a young team and we are looking down the road. I will be happy as long as we get better every game and every practice. And that has been the case so far. I was concerned we would take a step backwards today without Lauren but we really didn't."

Oakville will move on in the tournament in the consolation bracket against Clayton Tuesday at 4:30 p.m.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?

More from Mehlville-Oakville