The Seymour girls basketball walked into Jennings County with a five-game winning streak on Tuesday night, but that’s where it ended as the Panthers knocked off the Owls 70-42.
Right from the opening tip, it was apparent JC’s size was going to hurt Seymour. The Owls were out-rebounded 10-2 after the first quarter, but were able to stay within striking distance, only trailing 14-11. Kendall Sterling got fouled trying to beat the buzzer from half court, and she made all three free throws at the end of the quarter.
Rebounding continued to be an issue in the second quarter. Jennings County had an 18-6 advantage on the glass and took a 33-21 lead into halftime.
“They go get it,” head coach Jason Longmeier said on rebounding. “Being out of position hurt that as well. Our communication wasn’t very good on that end. I told this group at the end I love this group, it’s a great group of kids, but we’re too nice. We’re gonna have to be a little bit tougher.”
Kali Thompson hit three 3-pointers in the first half and also hit a runner in the lane as time expired to head into the locker room. Thompson had 11 points at the half, and Alivia Elmore had 12 to lead the Panthers. It was an and-one from Elmore attacking the basket that pushed the lead out to double digits in the second frame.
A Thompson 3-pointer (her fourth) with 3:21 left in the third gave the Panthers a 46-24.
Brooke Trinkle hit a layup at the buzzer at the end of the third quarter, and Journee Brown got an offensive put-back to start the fourth quarter to cut the deficit back to 20 points, 53-33.
But Jennings County continued its impressive shooting from beyond the arc. A 3-pointer from Elmore (her third of the night) gave the Panthers their largest lead of the night up to that point at 25.
In addition to the rebounding advantage, which Jennings County won 30-15, another huge difference was the 3-point shooting.
The Panthers hit nine 3-pointers on Tuesday night while the Owls didn’t make any.
“They were playing 15 feet off of us and packing the middle,” Longmeier said.
Sterling led the way for Seymour with 15 points while Grace Schrader added 13. Both of those Owls went 9-11 from the free-throw line.
It was a concerted effort by the Panthers to make Seymour’s role players beat them, but the Owls only had 5 players total score on Tuesday night (Sterling, Schrader, Trinkle, Brown and Lainey Jackson).
“Early on, their role players made a commitment to play and ours didn’t,” Longmeier said. “We weren’t in attack mode. They made a decision early on that Brooke wasn’t gonna beat them, Schrader wasn’t gonna beat them and Kendall wasn’t gonna beat them. When that happens, your role players gotta step up and play at a higher level.”
It doesn’t get any easier from here, either.
The Owls (5-3) will have a tough task coming up on Thursday when they play host to No. 4-ranked Bedford North Lawrence in Class 4A, who is 8-1 on the season.
“We’re not gonna fix some of our issues between now and Thursday, and that’s what we talked about in the locker room, but it’s gotta be fixed between now and the end of January, so we’re ready to roll when it matters,” Longmeier said. “We’ve gotten better. This was not indicative of how we’ve been doing. We’ll fix it, and we’ll get better.”