VERSAILLES – The Lady Tigers earned a senior night 67-51 win over the Mississinawa Lady Blackhawks in a Saturday night home game.
Versailles honored four seniors before the start of the game: No. 3 Molly Phelan, No. 4 Sarah Stammen, No. 13 Grace Osborne, and No. 25 Taylor Wagner.
“All four of these girls have impacted me as their coach, getting four years to coach them and watch them grow into the athletes they are,” said Versailles coach Tracy White. “This year they grew into such leaders. Every single one of them leads in a different way. They complement each other, and they hold their teammates accountable in a good and productive way. These four girls have contributed so much to our team’s success.”
The Lady Hawks jumped out to a 19-10 first-quarter lead, with Versailles rolling out a senior night lineup on the court.
“We kind of expect it on a day when it’s senior night, and you have all the different routines,” Versailles coach Tracy White said of the team’s slow start. “The nice thing was even though we had to dig ourselves out of a hole, we figured it out sooner than later.”
With the regular starters taking the floor, the Lady Tigers battled back with a 22-5 second quarter, including a 19-0 scoring run led by eight Katey Litten points, including two 3-pointers and 2-2 at the line and seven Tayor Wagner points sending the teams to the halftime break with Versailles up 32-24.
“We locked in on defense,” Coach White noted. “We were able to frustrate their team as a whole in the first half by being disciplined and where we needed to be.”
Versailles continued to add to its lead, outscoring the Lady Hawks 21-13 in the third quarter, taking advantage of six Wagner points, Litten with five, and a trey each from Sarah Stammen and Elli Stammen.
“Our girls were mentally tired from last night,” said MV coach Michael Paige. “We came out hard, we played as a team, then we got a couple of calls that didn’t go our way and our girls mentally fell apart and the result of it is what it is.”
Period No. 4 played out to a 14-14 standoff, with the Versailles Lady Tigers winning the non-conference matchup.
“We’re fine,” Coach Paige said. “We have a week of practice before our next game. We’ll settle back down, refocus, and go over some things. Versailles is a really good team. We didn’t have any focus today. I’m not making any excuses It was on us, mentally we checked out.”
Taylee Woodbury led the Lady Hawks and all scorers with a game-high 21 points. Litten led Versailles with 19 points, and Wagner scored 15 points.
BOXSCORE:
VERSAILLES , MISSISSINAWA VALLEY
VERSAILLES – K. Litten 19, T. Wagner 15, K. Hager 8, S. Stammen 7, E. Stammen 6, M. Phelan 4, I. Barga 3, J. Heitkamp 3, G. Osborne 2 – TOTALS 18 13-19 6 67
MISSISSINAWA VALLEY – T. Woodbury 21, P. Emrick 10, C. Hoggatt 8, B. Seubert 6, E. Byram 2, M. Hoggatt 2, S. Purdin 2 – TOTALS 14 5-8 6 51
PREBLE SHAWNEE – J. Mondello-Garrett 4, A. Apking 3, C. Hatmaker 3 – TOTALS 1 2-4 2 10
3-POINTERS
Versailles 6 (K. Litten 3, S. Stammen 1, I. Barga 1, E. Stammen 1)
Mississinawa Valley 6 (Taylee Woodbury 5, P. Emrick 1)
SCORE by QUARTERS
10-22-21-14 67 Versailles
19-05-13-14 51 Mississinawa Valley
