NEW PALESTINE — With New Castle clogging the lane, the Dragons launched a 3-point barrage in the first half, most of which missed.
Neither team could get shots to fall early. New Palestine dominated the glass in the first half, pushing ahead to a big halftime lead in large part due to second-chance points.
The Dragons kept pushing and opened Hoosier Heritage Conference play Tuesday with a 58-37 home win against New Castle.
“It feels real good,” New Palestine junior Jordan Reid said. “We wanted to send a message for conference, and I think we really did a good job, really played as a team tonight.”
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The New Palestine defense had a pretty specific goal coming into the game — slow down New Castle’s Cameron Tabor.
Tabor came into Tuesday’s contest averaging 27.9 points and 9.7 rebounds per game, huge numbers after seven games.
The Dragons were up to the task. Tabor scored just a single point in the first quarter and had four at halftime, two coming from free throws.
The task fell to Tatum Biddle and Michaela Jones. Biddle started the game assigned to Tabor. When she got into foul trouble, Jones took over.
“We had a goal to keep Tabor down and have her not score her average, and I think we did a really good job,” Reid said. “Congrats to Tatum and Mic for shutting her down. Big moves right there. They did their jobs.”
The New Castle standout finished the game with 16 points and just two rebounds, with most of her field goals coming when the game was far out of reach.
“I knew she was good from last year, obviously,” Biddle said. “I just knew that I had to do what I was working on in practice, and knew that my post players would be my help defensively if I got beat. That’s a good thing to have, knowing my teammates were behind me.”
The defense as a whole played tenacious. After holding the Trojans to just eight first-quarter points and forcing two five-second violations, the Dragons somehow tightened up even more, smothering the visitors and holding them to three points in the second quarter.
“Those are areas that we stress; kind of try to take their best player out of the picture if we can, as much as possible, and have really good help-side rotation, as much as we can,” New Palestine coach Sarah Gizzi said. “We really tried to deny their wings a little bit more, too. The girls really executed the gameplan.”
A big second quarter was the turning point for the Dragons. While the offense started slow, matching New Castle with just eight points in the first quarter, they were piling up the rebounds.
In the second quarter New Palestine found its shot, outscoring the Trojans 20-3 in the frame.
At the halftime break, the Dragons had 14 offensive rebounds. They finished the game with 16, as the shots started falling from the middle of the second period until the final buzzer. They outrebounded New Castle 37 to 16.
“We joked with them at halftime that we had so many rebounds because we were missing four and five shots,” Gizzi said. “But we just want them getting those shots, and looking at those shots, and they’ll fall. They did. We had a better second quarter there.”
Reid led the Dragons on offense, scoring 14 points and pulling in five offensive rebounds and seven total boards. Joining her in double figures was Leah Seib, who had 11 points and nine total rebounds. Megan Jolly had nine points, eight rebounds and three steals. Katie Herron and Haley Harrison each added eight points, with Herron also pulling in five offensive boards and nine total rebounds.
It was another strong all-around win for the Dragons, who move to 7-1 on the year and start HHC play with a 1-0 record.
“We have a tendency to have those small letdowns where we’ll give up a run here or there,” Gizzi said. “That was really our focus — we wanted to win and win in a commanding fashion. Once we’ve got that lead, can we maintain that lead or build on that lead?”
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New Palestine 58, New Castle 37
New Castle;8;3;14;12;—;37
New Palestine;8;20;13;17;—;58
New Castle (3-5, 1-2): Cameron Tabor 5 6-8 16, Cloie York 1 0-0 3, Alyssa Semler 3 4-6 12, Karsen Morgan 0 0-0 0, Macayla McGowan 1 1-2 3, Laila Smith 1 0-0 2, Molly Alspaugh 0 0-0 0, Mackenzie Bridgeman 0 1-2 1, Maddy Meek 0 0-0 0. Totals: 11 12-18 37.
New Palestine (7-1, 1-0): Haley Harrison 2 2-2 8, Leah Seib 5 0-0 11, Jordan Reid 7 0-1 14, Katie Herron 2 4-7 8, Megan Jolly 2 5-7 9, Michaela Jones 2 0-0 5, Tatum Biddle 1 1-2 3, Claire Cherry 0 0-0 0, Avery Biggs 0 0-0 0. Totals: 21 12-20 58.
3-point goals: New Palestine 4 (Harrison 2, Seib, Jones), New Castle 3 (Semler 2, York). Rebounds: New Palestine 37 (Seib 9, Herron 9, Jolly 8, Reid 7, Harrison 2, Biddle, Jones), New Castle 16 (Smith 6, McGowan 5, Semler 2, Tabor 2, York)
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