bluesooner17
Member
- Joined
- Mar 3, 2010
- Messages
- 863
- Reaction score
- 3
This time of the season, when you’re a good team capable of reaching the state tournament, improving each night is preferable to learning hard lessons.
Of course, if it can’t be the former, best to take advantage of the latter.
Such is the plight of the Norman High girls, who offered little in a 67-45 loss to Deer Creek Tuesday night at the NHS Gym.
There may have been contributing factors.
One, the Tigers were coming off a Crosstown Clash victory earned four nights earlier. and a letdown might have been predictable. Two, it was senior night and coach Michael Neal’s team remains fairly young.
“My thing was, I’ve got to find a way to get my seniors in and play a little more than 4 or 5 minutes,” he said. “I tried that at the beginning of the game.”
It didn’t work.
With 3:16 remaining in the first quarter — the moment Neal put his regular starting five on the court — the Antlers already led the Tigers 18-2 and NHS had already committed most of the 14 turnovers it suffered in the frame.
Still, if a few of Neal’s seldom-used veterans struggled, so did everybody else.
Seemingly stunned, the only move Neal made as the deficit approached 20 points in the opening frame was returning to to his conventional lineup, one that included junior Turner Mattingly, freshman Kelbie Washington and junior Nyah Henderson along with seniors Hayley Hurst and Kayla Albright.
He called only one timeout the entire game, coming in the third quarter.
Also, in the second quarter, his best lineup in the game, even amidst 10 Deer Creek turnovers, the Tigers were still outscored 13-11 on the way to a 38-20 halftime deficit.
The closest NHS ever got after the awful beginning was 14 points, 32-18, following a seven-point second quarter run.
The Tigers’ 13-point third quarter was their high-water mark for points in a frame. Nonetheless, they were outscored 16-13 and turned the ball over eight times.
“We have to take that one and let it settle,” Neal said. “It’s on me.”
While Deer Creek’s Skyler Vann led everybody with 24 points, no Tiger managed more than eight, the total belonging to both Mattingly and Hurst, who grabbed a game-high nine rebounds.
Mattingly, a junior guard starting for a third straight season, tried to make sense of it.
“I’m not really sure. I think we might have underestimated them a little,” she said. “We just have to learn from what happened and we have to bounce back.”
Long after the game had been decided, a fourth-quarter senior night moment arrived.
Inserted back into the game for the first time since the first quarter, senior Alexis Gatewood scored a basket and grabbed four rebounds, senior Taj Cox nailed a 3-pointer and senior Kamryn Defreeze put herself in the the scoring column with a 2-point basket.
Still, for the season to close well, the eighth-ranked Tigers will have to find themselves.
Clearly, they’re capable. Their last two victories have been impressive, wins over then-No. 3 Edmond Santa Fe and then-No. 10 Norman North. Now 14-6 on the season, it’s why the Class 6A coaches have them ranked No. 8.
However, the Tigers are also 2-3 over their last five outings, falling to Moore, seventh-ranked Edmond Memorial and now the Antlers.
“It’s uncharacteristic,” Neal said. Also, he added, “It’s all new to them,” alluding to some of the big wins his team has claimed and the opportunity it has to put the program back in the state tournament.
Now it’s about what happens next.
Friday, NHS is at Moore. Four nights later they’re in Stillwater. Three nights after that, the regular season concludes with one more Crosstown Clash, this time at NHS.
Time remains.
Of course, if it can’t be the former, best to take advantage of the latter.
Such is the plight of the Norman High girls, who offered little in a 67-45 loss to Deer Creek Tuesday night at the NHS Gym.
There may have been contributing factors.
One, the Tigers were coming off a Crosstown Clash victory earned four nights earlier. and a letdown might have been predictable. Two, it was senior night and coach Michael Neal’s team remains fairly young.
“My thing was, I’ve got to find a way to get my seniors in and play a little more than 4 or 5 minutes,” he said. “I tried that at the beginning of the game.”
It didn’t work.
With 3:16 remaining in the first quarter — the moment Neal put his regular starting five on the court — the Antlers already led the Tigers 18-2 and NHS had already committed most of the 14 turnovers it suffered in the frame.
Still, if a few of Neal’s seldom-used veterans struggled, so did everybody else.
Seemingly stunned, the only move Neal made as the deficit approached 20 points in the opening frame was returning to to his conventional lineup, one that included junior Turner Mattingly, freshman Kelbie Washington and junior Nyah Henderson along with seniors Hayley Hurst and Kayla Albright.
He called only one timeout the entire game, coming in the third quarter.
Also, in the second quarter, his best lineup in the game, even amidst 10 Deer Creek turnovers, the Tigers were still outscored 13-11 on the way to a 38-20 halftime deficit.
The closest NHS ever got after the awful beginning was 14 points, 32-18, following a seven-point second quarter run.
The Tigers’ 13-point third quarter was their high-water mark for points in a frame. Nonetheless, they were outscored 16-13 and turned the ball over eight times.
“We have to take that one and let it settle,” Neal said. “It’s on me.”
While Deer Creek’s Skyler Vann led everybody with 24 points, no Tiger managed more than eight, the total belonging to both Mattingly and Hurst, who grabbed a game-high nine rebounds.
Mattingly, a junior guard starting for a third straight season, tried to make sense of it.
“I’m not really sure. I think we might have underestimated them a little,” she said. “We just have to learn from what happened and we have to bounce back.”
Long after the game had been decided, a fourth-quarter senior night moment arrived.
Inserted back into the game for the first time since the first quarter, senior Alexis Gatewood scored a basket and grabbed four rebounds, senior Taj Cox nailed a 3-pointer and senior Kamryn Defreeze put herself in the the scoring column with a 2-point basket.
Still, for the season to close well, the eighth-ranked Tigers will have to find themselves.
Clearly, they’re capable. Their last two victories have been impressive, wins over then-No. 3 Edmond Santa Fe and then-No. 10 Norman North. Now 14-6 on the season, it’s why the Class 6A coaches have them ranked No. 8.
However, the Tigers are also 2-3 over their last five outings, falling to Moore, seventh-ranked Edmond Memorial and now the Antlers.
“It’s uncharacteristic,” Neal said. Also, he added, “It’s all new to them,” alluding to some of the big wins his team has claimed and the opportunity it has to put the program back in the state tournament.
Now it’s about what happens next.
Friday, NHS is at Moore. Four nights later they’re in Stillwater. Three nights after that, the regular season concludes with one more Crosstown Clash, this time at NHS.
Time remains.
