By T. Scott Boatright
The Cedar Creek girls basketball team clicked on all cylinders from start to finish Wednesday night as the Cougars roared away to a 83-53 win Division IV playoff win over Hamilton Christian at The Brickhouse.
“It was just a great, all around team effort,” said Cedar Creek coach Gene Vandenlangenberg. “We had a lot of solid rebounding. We played solid defense. We made a lot of great passes for assists. It was unselfish play all around.
“Hamilton Christian is a good little team – they’re not bad. They’re real young. But we had a great crowd that provided a great atmosphere. They fed off our girls and our girls fed off of them. Everybody was into the game and it was a really good win.”
Not surprisingly, Sarah Adams led the Lady Cougars with 29 points. But Vandenlangenberg said it wasn’t only her scoring that made his senior point guard so effective on the night.
“She scored 29 points but I think she had around 10 assists,” Vandenlangenberg said about Adams. “To score 29 points and still get your teammates involved with great passes, that’s really good.”
Cedar Creek led 21-9 at the end of the opening stanza and 40-19 at the half thanks to a strong early effort from Allie Furr, who finished with 12 points.
“Allie had a real strong start and scored 10 points in the first half,” Vandenlangenberg said. “She was just shooting the ball really well. She made four or five shots in a row and then she played great defense on (Hamilton Christian’s) best player. So she did it on both sides of the court.”
Cedar Creek stretched its lead to 61-36 by the end of the third quarter, giving Vandenlandenberg the opportunity to go deep into his bench. Eleven different Lady Cougars added to their scoring effort, with Lizzie McAdams adding 12 points and Mille Venters chipping in with 10.
“Lizzie made some shots in the second half and kinda carried us at that point,’ Vandenlandenberg said. “That’s what I meant by a great all around team effort.
“Then Millie had 10 points and played a big role. She probably had 10 rebounds, too. To score 83 points and have so many girls in the game is something I’m really proud of.”
Second-seeded Cedar Creek will now turn its attention to Central Catholic, which the Lady Cougars will play host to on Saturday with the opening tip set for 5:30 p.m.
Seventh-seeded Central Catholic defeated Catholic Private 62-37 Wednesday night.
“It’s hard to predict, but we definitely played a solid game both offensively and defensively,” Vandenlangenberg said of the win over Hamilton Christian. “We played as a team – unselfishly. We were all on the same page, so I think we’ve got a lot of momentum going into Saturday, especially being at home with the kind of atmosphere we had tonight.
“I think we definitely feel good about where we’re at having a home game coming off a big win like tonight.”
Photo: Darrell James (dgjames.photoshelter.com)
