H.S. Girls Basketball: Michigan City 62, Crown Point 43

Team /Record	1	2	3	4	Final
Michigan City (6-2, 4-2 DAC)	14	8	22	18	62
CROWN POINT (4-7, 0-6 DAC)	6	12	13	12	43

Friday, December 14, 2007 - Duneland Athletic Conference game at CROWN POINT, IN

MICHIGAN CITY (62) TaKenya Nixon 5-2-12, Bianca McGee 6-2-17, Missy Johnson 2-4-8, Katie Knoll 3-0-7, Essence Robinson 4-2-11, Maggie Gondeck 1-0-2, Shanice Taylor 0-2-2, Jackie Davis 1-0-2, Daralyn Richards 0-1-1, Natalie Studtman 0-0-0, Liandra Cash 0-0-0. TOTALS: 22 (13-16) 62.

CROWN POINT (43) Sydnee Reeves 2-4-8, Daniela Tarailo 4-1-11, Flori Garcia 5-0-13, Maegen Maloney 1-2-5, Lynsey Brucato 2-0-4, Zarah Cecich 1-0-2, Clare Grubnich -0-0, Abby Thomas 0-0-0, Nicci Brown 0-0-0, Samantha Polus 0-0-0, Madeline Moore 0-0-0. TOTALS: 15 (7-12) 43.

FREE THROWS: MICHIGAN CITY (13-16, 81.2%) Johnson 4-4, Nixon 2-3, McGee 2-2, Taylor 2-2, Richards 1-2, Robinson 2-3;
CROWN POINT (7-14, 50%) Reeves 4-6, Tarailo 1-2, Maloney 2-2, Brucato 0-2, Seils 0-2.

REBOUNDS: MICHIGAN CITY (29) Nixon 6, McGee 6, Johnson 5, Gondeck 4, Robinson 4, Knoll 3, Cash.
CROWN POINT (28) Tarailo 6, Maloney 5, Reeves 5, Grubnich 5, Polus 5, Garcia 3, Martinez, Seils.

ASSISTS: MICHIGAN CITY (7) Nixon 3, Knoll, Studtman, McGee, Robinson; CROWN POINT (5) Tarailo 2, Maloney, Garcia, Polus.

STEALS: MICHIGAN CITY (8) McGee 2, Nixon 4, Robinson, Knoll; CROWN POINT (4) Garcia 2, Maloney, Moore.

TURNOVERS: MICHIGAN CITY (1-5-2-2) 10; CROWN POINT (6-7-7-3) 23.

3-GOALS: MICHIGAN CITY (5) Bianca McGee 3, Katie Knoll, Essence Robinson; CROWN POINT (6) Flori Garcia 3, Daniela Tarailo 2, Maegen Maloney.

CROWN POINT (12-14-2007) This game did come out the way it was supposed to. The defending Duneland Athletic Conference (DAC) champion Michigan City Wolves used a big second half to pull away from Crown Point 62-43.

But it wasn't a 20-point game all night. In fact, it was 22-18 at the half. If both sides look at what might happen when the teams meet again (and in the DAC they always meet again), there is some reason for optimism/concern here.

Granted. Michigan City (6-2, 4-2) led by junior guards TaKenya Nixon and Bianca McGee, plus a big boost from 5-foot-11 sophomore Essence Robinson, scored the first nine points of the second half and realistically ended any chance of the home team to win. But Crown Point (4-7, 0-6) scored only six first half baskets. They could hardly have shot the ball worse and made 13 turnovers.

"We let them stay in the game," said Michigan City coach Gary Collins. "At first, I was going big (using a big lineup) because they couldn't match up. But it didn't matter because we weren't getting the ball down low. So then we got quicker (used a smaller lineup) and got the ball down low that way."

Nixon, McGee and Robinson rushed the lead up to 44-26 with 1:02 left in the third period as CP could not keep up in a fast-paced quarter. But this was a night where CP may have found a '4th amigo', a fourth player capable of double figure scoring nights.

Junior Guard Flori Garcia confidently knocked down open shots and led CP with 13 points. Add that to the totals recorded by Daniela Tarailo (11) Sydnee Reeves (8) and a heavily guarded Maegen Maloney (5) and there's the solid base of scoring from starting players that CP has lacked all season.

CP coach Scott Reid thought Garcia took what the defense gave her as MC ran some tight defense at Maloney, CP's top three-point scorer.

"I said to Maegen, You know Maegen, they're running at you," said Reid. "'Flori', I told her, 'You see they're not running at you. They didn't think you could hit those shots.' So, good for her. Of course, next time, here they come at you."

There was some of that in the second half as Nixon switched over to guard Garcia after half-time and the Wolves came out with a new attitude. The Wolves' second loss of the season impacted them more than the first defeat, a 74-65 loss to Valparaiso where Valpo got 55 free throws.

"We were very disappointed at Merrillville," said Collins. "We put the first loss off to the refs: 55 foul shots. It wasn't our game. But Merrillville just outhustled us. They outplayed us. It woke us up to the idea that we've got to play harder every night in the Duneland Conference. Because we do want to win it again. You have to put away teams like Crown Point early. They are a perimeter defense team. They didn't have an answer for our post players, but we didn't get the ball in there."

Crown Point got enough rebounds to stay in the game and a couple of misses at the start of the third quarter actually could have given CP the lead in front of about 200 fans on a cold December night. But the bigger Wolves created some transition baskets and they got the ball off the glass after the glass most of the second half. Plus, Bianca McGee hit three three-point goals in the second half and a 10-0 run in the final quarter ran the lead up to 54-34 with 5:13 to play and allowed both benches to play.

"We need to put emphasis on the boards. Chesterton out-rebounded us," said Collins. "Valparaiso outrebounded us. Merrillville outrebounded us. We're sick of getting out-rebounded. But we started to get to the basket in the second half and we hit some shots. It was a good win."

CP coach Scott Reid knows his team isn't going to get any easy games in DAC play and that's every single game (the final eight) after Saturday's nonconference matchup with Hanover Central (6-2).

"That's what makes it a good league," he said. "There's a good team to play every week. As soon as they started hitting those 3s in the second half, that was it. At the start of the second half, we miss a layup and they hit a '3'. That's a five-point swing right there. It was downhill from there, but it shouldn't have been."

Reid stayed positive in the face of the Bulldogs' toughest stretch of the season, five games in nine days. It is not an exaggeration to say that, since the advent of the double- round robin 14-game league schedule, the second half of the Crown Point Lady Bulldog schedule has been a mine field for CP.

"Flori did well," he said. "Sydney did some good things. But we've got to stay away from those three or four minute stretches where we do nothing on offense. Two three-minute spurts where we didn't score were the difference tonight. We've got to find a way to eliminate those."

DOG NOTES: Crown Point guard Daniela Tarailo was injured late in the first half and walked tenderly to the dressing room for treatment. But the 5-10 junior was able to return and score seven points in the third quarter.

Michigan City coach Gary Collins insists that winning the Duneland Athletic Conference (DAC) is more important to them than winning the South Bend Holiday tourney [Dec. 27-28 at Riley with Clay (8-1) in the field] or beating 4A No.1 (South Bend) Washington (9-0), the nation's No. 6 team on Jan. 4.

"We want to win the DAC," he said. "We want to see that plaque up on the wall again and see our names under it. We want to show the teams (from South Bend) that if we see them in the regional that we're tough."

"South Bend teams play a lot different from DAC teams," observed Collins. "They run up and down the floor. It's a race. Merrillville gets you ready for games like that. And Merrillville showed us that we aren't ready for Washington yet. And what would Clay and (Elkhart) Memorial do to us?

MC freshman Maggie Gondeck, a 6-foot-2 center, is a very interesting prospect.

"She's not slow and she's got good hands," said Collins of his big 15-year-old. "But she isn't in the right position yet. She doesn't know where she should be on the floor. She'll get it."

Crown Point freshman Madeline Moore continues to get minutes when the game is still on the line. Moore, a 5-foot-8 forward, had two assists against Michigan City.

CP coach Scott Reed knows he can't do much about the DAC schedule, but he'd like to break up the annual 5-games-in-9-days CP December marathon. The game that might be bounced could be the border war with 2A Hanover Central.

"Hanover is so close, we could play them on a Tuesday night," said Reid. "Normally I'd be glad to get back on the court and play again, but we're pretty beaten up with all these games."

CLASS	SECTIONAL	JOHN HARRELL'S INDIANA HIGH SCHOOL BASKETBALL		GIRLS' SEASONS
4A	2	E-MAIL CORRECTIONS	MAP TO SCHOOL	4-7
4A	2	TOURNAMENT HISTORY		4-7
CROWN POINT BULLDOGS Coach: Scott Reid, 4-7 in 1st year at school

DATE	OPPONENT	RESULT / CST
Nov. 9	at Hebron {2A}	W 54- 39
Nov. 10	at Kankakee Valley {3A}	W 59- 31
Nov. 16	Portage {4A}‡	L 39- 48
Nov. 17	at Warsaw {4A}	L 41- 48
Nov. 23	at Chesterton {4A}‡	L 30- 35
Nov. 27	at Lowell {4A}	W 49- 27
Nov. 30	LaPorte {4A}‡	L 27- 38
Dec. 7	at Lake Central {4A}‡	ot L 48- 51
Dec. 8	Boone Grove {2A}	W 53- 40
Dec. 11	at Valparaiso {4A}‡	L 37- 50
Dec. 14	Michigan City {4A}‡	L 43- 62
Dec. 15	Hanover Central {2A}	7:30 pm
Dec. 22	at Portage {4A}‡	7:30 pm
Dec. 29	Merrillville {4A}‡	7:30 pm
Jan. 4	Chesterton {4A}‡	6:00 pm
Jan. 12	Lake Central {4A}‡	7:30 pm
Jan. 18	at Michigan City {4A}‡	7:30 pm
Jan. 22	at LaPorte {4A}‡	7:30 pm
Jan. 25	Valparaiso {4A}‡	7:30 pm
Feb. 2	at Merrillville {4A}‡	7:30 pm
‡DUNELAND CONFERENCE GAME

Michigan City overwhelms Lady Bulldogs 62-43