ARCANUM – The Arcanum Lady Trojans defeated the Ansonia Lady Tigers 43-32 in Tuesday night WOAC competition on the Lady Trojans home court.
“Anytime you get a win in the conference that’s a sigh of relief because everybody comes out and is ready to play,” said veteran Arcanum coach, Abbey Moore. “I’m proud of their effort and getting win No. 2.”
Ansonia took the court with a new head coach, new system in play, no seniors while looking to build a program for the Lady Tigers basketball program.
“That’s are mantra,” Ansonia coach, Keenan Leichty stated. “That’s what we’ve been talking about from day one. They have been buying into the process, they know it’s not going to be easy.”
“We have a style of ball that we want to play and I think we are going to get there,” added Leichty. “They are buying in.”
Arcanum got balanced scoring in the opening quarter to lead 13-4 after one paced by Alexis Gibbons and Kaitlyn Toy each tossing in 5-points.
Ansonia rebounded to take period No. 2 by a 13-12 count led by Gabby Leeper’s f-points, Rose Barga with four and Brenna Schmit with a trey sending the teams to the break with Arcanum leading 25-17.
The Lady Trojans pushed its lead to 37-24 after three quarters of action led by Gibbons 5-points including 3-3 at the charity stripe.
The fourth quarter proved to be a defensive battle with Arcanum taking the quarter 8-6 to earn the win.
“These girls are fun to be around, this team is fun,” said Coach Moore. “They are great girls and it makes it easy to come in every day and be in the gym with them. When you have no attitude problems, no other distractions it just makes it fun and I truly enjoy coaching them.”
“We have a style of ball that we want to play and I think we are going to get there,” said Leichty. “We hustled, we did some tweaks within our schemes that we never really practiced before because we didn’t think we were ready but we had to pull them out. They didn’t look half bad because of our hustle and our tenacious will to not give up – that was the biggest thing we saw as a staff.”
Gibbons led Arcanum and all scorers with a game high 17-points. The Lady Trojans were 10-18 at the free throw line for 56-percent shooting. Ansonia finished the night at the charity stripe 4-14 for 29 percent.
The Ansonia Lady Tigers 2022-23 high school basketball program numbers 16 members; eight freshmen, five sophomores and three juniors.
“I think these ladies, if they stick to the plan, keep setting the culture like we talk about, we will be a fun team to watch,” Coach Leichty concluded. “II think people will come out and watch us.”
The Arcanum Lady Trojans 2022-23 high school basketball program numbers 12 members; four freshmen, three sophomores, three juniors and two seniors following a 2021-2022 season that saw the entire starting lineup graduate.
“The progress that we’ve made from game one from Bishop Fenwick to where we are now makes me happy,” Coach Moore stated. “As long as we continue to make those improvements and get better each and every day, we’re going to be all right.”
Arcanum improves to 2-1 while Ansonia stands at 0-1 on the new 2022-23 season.
BOXSCORE:
ARCANUM 43, ANSONIA 32
ARCANUM – A. Gibbons 17, K. Toy 11, K. Freeman 6, A. Miller 3, B. Anderson 3, R. Leeper 3 – TOTALS 12 10-18 3 43
ANSONIA – Brenna Schmit 9, Bailey Schmit 8, G. Leeper 7, R. Barga 4, A. Locke 2, A. Marker 1, B. Burk 1 – TOTALS 11 4-14 2 32
3-POINTERS
Arcanum 3 (A. Gibbons 2, R. Leeper 1)
Ansonia 2 (Brenna Schmit 1, G. Leeper 1)
SCORE by QUARTERS
13-12-12-06 43 Arcanum
04-13-07-08 32 Ansonia
