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BY VAL TSOUTSOURIS
Sports Editor, RTC
ARGOS –- Lizzy Edmonds scored a game-high 15 points, and the Argos girls basketball team held Winamac to just one made 3-point field goal in recording a 46-27 win at Phil Weybright Gymnasium Friday.
Bella Stults and Carleigh Miller added eight points each, and Emma Dunlap added
seven for the Lady Dragons, who won their third straight game to improve to 3-1.
Piper Link led Winamac with 11 points. The Lady Warriors dropped to 1-2.
The win was Argos’ first over Winamac since Dec. 10, 2015. Winamac had won the previous four meetings.
Argos allowed 50 points to Caston in their season-opening loss but is allowing just 30 points per game during their winning streak.
In preparing for the game, Argos coach Scott Jennings noticed that Winamac set a lot of screens.
“We knew that coming in,” Jennings said. “I saw some game film on them against Westville (a 37-28 Winamac win on Tuesday), and they set a lot of high screens. They run people low and bring them up high off screens. I just told them we’ve got to fight through those screens or at least help and recover a little bit on them. I thought we did a real good job on that tonight.”
Argos led 19-9 at halftime, and Winamac got the deficit down to nine on two occasions in the second half, the last on a Kingsley Kroft free throw with 5:54 left.
That made the score 23-14, but that turned out to be Kroft’s last point of the game. Kroft scored 13 against Westville on Tuesday but just two against Argos before fouling out.
“We started out in a box-in-one on the Kroft girl, and she didn’t have a field goal tonight, and I thought between Bella Stults and Sam Redinger, I thought they did a heck of a job on her,” Jennings said. “She had two free throws. We contained her real well.”
But Redinger scored on an air ball putback, and Edmonds hit a left elbow jumper.
Link scored on a layup, but an Edmonds blocked shot set up an Edmonds kick out assist to Miller for a 3-pointer from in front of the Argos bench to extend the lead to 14.
A Stults putback made it 32-16.
Stults self-identifies as a wing, but she said she will help out the 6-0 Edmonds in the post “once in awhile.”
“We’ve really worked on pressing teams and running the ball as much as we can just to wear the other team down and get easy points on them,” Stults said. “We just play with confidence now and know how to play our game since the first game.”
The 19-point margin of victory equaled Argos’ largest lead.
Offensively, Jennings emphasizes floor spacing and sound passing. Miller hit two 3-pointers, and Dunlap hit one. Redinger contributed six points.
“We’re trying to do that more,” Jennings said of the good passing, which led to just 10 turnovers. “There are times we still force the ball, or we still try to dump it into Liz when it’s not quite there. I told them at halftime, if the pass isn’t there right away, don’t force it. You’ve got to make that quick decision. We’re getting better at that. We’re not making near the turnovers we were last year at this time. That’s an improvement. Our passing game is coming. And if we keep the floor spread, we’ve got a lot of threats offensively.”
Due to a lack of numbers, Jennings said that JV games will consist of only two quarters for the rest of the season.
Argos has 12 players in the program, and junior post player Amanda Fajardo is currently out with an ankle injury. X-rays were negative, and Jennings hopes to have her back for the Nov. 23 game against Culver.
Argos 46, Winamac 27
WINAMAC (27) (1-2)
Maggie Smith 0 0-0 0, Kingsley Kroft 0 2-4 2, Kaya Campbell 2 2-2 6, Ella Gearhart 1 4-4 6, Piper Link 4 2-4 11, Hailey Attinger 0 2-4 2, Lily Bennett 0 0-0 0, Mershai Loehmer 0 0-0 0, Chloe Rausch 0 0-0 0
TEAM: 7 12-18 27
ARGOS (46) (3-1)
Samantha Redinger 2 2-3 6, Emma Dunlap 3 0-0 7, Bella Stults 3 2-2 8, Sophia Bollenbacher 1 0-0 2, Lizzy Edmonds 7 1-3 15, Allison Zahm 0 0-0 0, Carleigh Miller 3 0-0 8
TEAM: 19 5-8 46
Three-point field goals:
Winamac 1 (Link),
Argos 3 (Miller 2, Dunlap)
Total fouls: Winamac 12, Argos 13
Fouled out: Kroft (WIN)
Turnovers: Winamac 15, Argos 10
Scoore by quarters
Winamac 3 6 9 9 – 27
Argos 8 11 15 12 – 46
Watch Game Here:
