Sports
Stars win second of the season against Our Redeemer's
Tyler Ohmann
12/27/2011
An early Christmas gift came to the Bottineau Stars, but don’t think they didn’t deserve it. I think old Kris Kringle saw that they were nice this year.
The gift was a 56-49 win over region rival Our Redeemers, a team the Stars tangle with in many sports.
“They are always a really good team no matter what sport it is,” said senior captain Heidi Artz, who is a five-year varsity player. “So we have to come out and be ready to play.”
The Stars did just that jumping out to an early lead and eventually led by as much as 16 in the third quarter.
The strong effort in the second half came from some patience according to Artz.
“We really just needed to slow down our offense,” Artz said. “They were back cutting on us and we were being too aggressive on defense, so just communicating on defense. If we do well on defense it will just roll over on to our offense.”
The struggle came to a climax after sophomore Danielle McDonald scored in the wrong basket. That sparked a run by the Lady Knights, who made it a game in the fourth quarter.
Artz said nerves had something to do with it as the Stars still have several freshman and sophomores who see plenty of playing time.
“We are still a young team, so sometimes we get those nerves and get going to fast in our heads,” Artz said. “We just need to slow the game down, and execute our game and I think we were just rushing too many things on offense.”
Regardless the outcome was positive, but the way they got there was a little disappointing for Artz and the Stars.
“We were glad to get the win, but we were definitely not satisfied with how we played,” Artz said. “We were up by 13 at one time and 16 another time and when we are up like that we need to keep them down, and we didn’t do that tonight.”
“That is what we are really going to look at in practice in the future,” Artz added.
Artz led the Stars with 16 points. The senior also added five rebounds, three steals and two assists.
Also making an impact on offense were McDonald (15 points, four rebounds) and Katryna Hahn (12 points).
Artz thinks that the Stars can use the win to propel themselves following the holiday break.
“It definitely gives us the momentum going into our next game with a win,” Artz said. “It is definitely easier going into practice after a win. We are just going to try and get a couple more good practices in, and we are not going to come out easy after the break.”
The win improved Bottineau’s record to 2-1.
The Stars will open their post-break schedule with a road game at North Star at 6 p.m. tonight. It will continue with a home game at 4 p.m. on Thursday against Watford City.