Center Grove’s Ella Hobson, right, tries to steal the ball from Greenwood’s Emily Metzger on Tuesday night.
Chris Williams | For the Daily Journal
Even in basketball, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Such was the case Tuesday night as Greenwood and Center Grove, teams built on defensive tenacity, renewed their longstanding rivalry with the host Trojans winning, 39-18.
Junior guard Ella Hobson led all scorers with 14 points for Center Grove (12-9), followed by sophomore guard Audrey Annee, who converted three 3-pointers on her way to 12 points off the bench in what was the Trojans’ 10th consecutive win in the series.
Both teams lived up to their reputations as evidenced by the shooting percentages — the Woodmen’s 20.8% to the Trojans’ 34.2% — and the fact they combined to turn the ball over 32 times. Yet from 5:52 of the second quarter to the 3:15 mark of the third, Center Grove outscored Greenwood, 15-4, with Hobson accounting for nine points.
“I felt like we weren’t really attacking much on offense,” Hobson said. “I kind of saw where the opening was and just took it, and was able to find my open teammates. Our focus was a little off in the beginning, but at halftime we just settled down a little bit and talked about what we needed to work on.”
The Trojans clung to a 14-10 halftime advantage before breaking the game open in the third quarter.
After a 5-5 deadlock through one quarter, Center Grove junior Savanna Bischoff buried a triple from the right wing 17 seconds into the second stanza to briefly give her squad the advantage. Woodmen junior guard Lily Howe responded with a baseline trey just over a minute later, but Annee answered with one of her own to start a 6-2 scoring run.
Howe’s hoop at the 6:31 mark was the Woodmen’s final basket of the half. Greenwood finished 5 of 24 from the floor compared to Center Grove’s 13 of 38. The Trojans won the rebounding battle, 25-16, as soph forward Rachel Wirtz corralled seven and Brooklyn Bell and Quinn Kelly grabbed five apiece for the Woodmen (11-10).
Howe led Greenwood with 10 points.
“I think when you have familiar foes that you’ve played already this year, you have some stuff on film,” said Center Grove coach Kevin Stuckmeyer, whose team defeated the Woodmen in November in a Johnson County tournament semifinal. “(Greenwood coach Justin) Bennett has done a really good job defensively. They really play hard defensively, and they’re taught really well defensively.
“We weren’t shocked by their switching of defenses, but our girls just weren’t focused enough for that (early), so they caught them off guard. They’ve done that to a lot of people. We weren’t as focused as I thought we should be, and we weren’t as poised as I thought we should be. We just had to get back to doing what we do.”
Both teams close their regular-season schedules Friday night. Center Grove hosts Lawrence North in what will be the Trojans’ farewell game as a member of the Metropolitan Interscholastic Conference. The Woodmen are at Mid-State Conference foe Perry Meridian.
