COVINGTON – The Covington Lady Buccaneers defeated the Bradford Lady Railroaders 70-43 to win the consolation game of the sixth annual Buccaneers Holiday Classic.
“We have some things to work on but it was a good win,” said Covington coach, Shawn Naff. “A win is a win – good win.”
Covington grabbed an early lead and took the opening quarter 24-9 led by senior Carlie Besecker’s 12 first-quarter points including her 1,000th career point. Besecker entered the game needing just seven points to hit one thousand.
“Carlie Besecker and Gracie Anderson are both four-year starters and they have been huge for this program and a ton of wins,” Naff stated. “They’ve been a part of a lot of great teams so very impressed with Carlie and she is going to probably end up towards the top of career rebounds also at Covington.”
The Lady Buccaneers made it a 48-22 halftime score putting another 24 points on the board while holding Bradford to 13 points. Maddie Anderson paced Covington with eight second-quarter points including 4-4 at the charity stripe.
Period No. 3 had the Lady Buccaneers get within a couple points of putting a running clock in play but the Lady Railroaders kept battling back to keep the clock running. Vivian Harleman accounted for seven third quarter Bradford points and Brooklyn Crickmore added six Lady Roader points including 4-4 at the line in a quarter Bradford won 13-11 sending the game to the fourth with Covington leading 59-35.
Covington took the fourth quarter 11-8 to earn the non-conference win.
“The three freshmen coming off the bench and Gabby Hartwig started in place of an injured point guard,” Coach Naff said. “They stepped up huge along with our big three of Carlie Besecker, Gracie Anderson and Maddie Anderson.”
We did a great job of handling the pressure in the second half when went to a 2-1-2 zone to kind of stop the bleeding,” said Bradford coach, John Siedling. “We worked the ball movement in that second half and found the shooters.”
Covington was 13-15 for 87 percent free throw shooting with the Lady Roaders right behind at 10-12 for 83 percent.
Besecker led Covington and all scorers with a game-high 19 points including 4-4 at the charity Stipe. Maddie Anderson chipped in 16 Lady Buccaneers points including a perfect 8-8 at the line.
Bradford freshman, Vivian Harleman paced the Lady Roaders with 16 points including four 3-pointers and Brooklyn Crickmore accounted for 12 points including 8-9 at the charity stripe.
“We have a couple of new freshmen and they can shoot the lights out,” said Siedling. “Their confidence is slowly starting to get better and build on the program. They put the work in so I’m happy to see it finally starting to roll in the right direction for them.”
BOXSCORE:
COVINGTON – C. Besecker 19, M. Anderson 16, D. Murphy 11, G. Anderson 11, E. Johnson 6, S. Newhouse 5, G. Hartwig 2 – TOTALS 21 15-13 5 70
BRADFORD – V. Harleman 16, B. Crickmore 12, C. Hill 5, A. Helman 5, R. Dotson 3, M. Wood 2 – TOTALS 6 10-12 7 43
3-POINTERS
Covington 5 (G. Anderson 3, S. Newhouse 1, C. Besecker 1)
Bradford 7 (V. Harleman 4, C. Hill 1, R. Dotson 1, A. Helman 1)
SCORE by QUARTERS
24-24-11-11 70 Covington
09-13-13-08 43 Bradford
