Carroll girls let two games slip past them
By Jim McCarter Contributing sportswriter

Carroll girls' basketball team lost a pair of heartbreakers at home, dropping to 5-5 at the midway point of the 2007-08 season. Victory was within their reach in both games, but the Lady Cougars were unable to finish strong.

West Lafayette erased a 6- point fourth-quarter deficit to defeat Carroll 43-37 Thursday night. Saturday morning, the Lady Cougars fell 43-40 to the University Trailblazers in the first game of the 2007 Carroll Classic.

A second game was scheduled for the Lady Cougars Saturday afternoon, but the Lowell Red Devils decided not to make the 90-mile trip due to the winter storm warning. That game has been tentatively rescheduled for Dec. 29.

In Thursday's game versus West Lafayette, the Lady Cougars hit their first two shots to take a 4-0 lead, then shot 2 for 18 the rest of the first half. Carroll did not hit a field goal in the second quarter. Fortunately, the Lady Cougars were able to find the net on 7 of 9 free-throw attempts to keep the game close, and trailed just 23- 19 at halftime.

"We struggled offensively all night long," Carroll coach Mike McCroskey said. "We haven't even been executing our offense well in practice. We need more ball reversal to make it harder for teams to defend us."

The third quarter saw a complete turnaround. Carroll dominated the stanza, outscoring the Red Devils 12-2 to take a 31-25 lead into the fourth quarter. The Lady Cougars' thirdquarter defense held West Lafayette to 1-of-6 shooting from the field and forced 10 turnovers.

"In the second half I thought we played our 2-3 defense as well as we have all year," Mc- Croskey said. "We just had a couple of breakdowns that led to layups."

Morgan Yoder, Quinci Eller and Jaime McCarter each had three steals for Carroll.

Carroll's 6-point lead didn't last long. West Lafayette scored two quick baskets to trim the lead to 31-29 with 7:22 to go. The Lady Cougars managed to score just one point in the first 4:47 of the fourth quarter, allowing the Red Devils to take a 35-32 advantage. Carroll went to the free-throw line three times in the fourth quarter, hitting just 3 of 6 attempts.

Krystal Brazel hit a 3-pointer from the top of the key with 1:27 left to cut West Lafayette's lead to 38-37, but the Lady Cougars didn't score the rest of the way, missing three shots in the final 1:12.

"When it comes to crunch time we don't use our heads very well," McCroskey said. "The effort was there, but we missed free throws down the stretch, and just didn't stay with our fundamentals with the game on the line."

Brazel led Carroll with 9 points and 5 rebounds. Eller added 7 and Morgan Yoder scored 6.

Vs. West Lafayette JV

Carroll's junior varsity lost a close two-quarter game to the Red Devils, 17-14. The game was tied 9-9 after the first quarter then West Lafayette pulled away for the victory. Sisters Jessica and Carly Yoder led Carroll's attack, each scoring 5 points, and Kayla Tussinger added 4.

Carroll Classic

The Lady Cougars faced University, a small private school in Carmel, in Saturday morning's opening game. The Class A #8 Trailblazers improved their record to 7-2 with a hard-fought 43-40 victory that wasn't decided until the final three seconds.

"Our games are starting to look like a broken record," Mc- Croskey said. "We missed five shots from three feet in the first three minutes. We are so close to being a really good basketball team, yet we're so far away."

Another strong defensive effort and 3-point baskets by Mc- Carter and Brooke Yoder allowed the Lady Cougars to stay close, 11-10, at the first stop. Carroll hit just 4 of 14 field-goal attempts in the first quarter.

Back-to-back 3-pointers by the Trailblazers' Aly Hughes and Bria Sneed gave University its biggest lead of the first half, 20-15, with 4:03 left. A pair of free throws by Eller and two more 3-point bombs by McCarter got the Lady Cougars back within one at halftime, 24-23.

The second half was close all the way, but Carroll only manged to take the lead once, 27-26, when Sarah Griffin grabbed an offensive rebound and put the ball in the basket with 3:43 left in the third quarter. Carroll trailed 32-30 after three.

Another three pointer by Sneed and a lay up by Maggie Dooley gave University a 41- 35 lead with 3:22 to go, but the Lady Cougars battled back. With 3:00 left Abby Reinke turned one of her game-high 11 rebounds into an easy basket, after two minutes of turnovers and missed shots by both teams, Brazel hit another 3-pointer to cut the gap to 41- 40 with exactly 1:00 remaining.

Carroll was then forced to put University on the freethrow line to get the ball back, and the Trailblazers converted on 2 of 4 attempts. The Lady Cougars had the ball, trailing 43-40 with :10 left. McCarter was fouled attempting a 3- point shot with :03 left, but the official ruled she was passing the ball. The Lady Cougars got one last chance, taking the ball out under their own basket, but the inbounds pass went long, into the backcourt and time ran out.

Carroll shot better in the second half, hitting 7 of 17 attempts compared to 8 of 28 in the first half, but turnovers killed any momentum the Lady Cougars got going. Carroll committed 16 second-half turnovers, 9 in the decisive fourth quarter.

"Every time we got close we shot ourselves in the foot," Mc- Croskey said. "It wasn't anything University did to us, we just had horrible fundamentals. Our defense was pretty good all night, but we don't value the basketball enough on offense. Our mistakes aren't aggressive mistakes, we just don't use our brains."

Eller and Brazel shared scoring honors for Carroll with 11 apiece. McCarter had 9. M. Yoder took an elbow to the face and left the game with a broken nose.

In the second and final Carroll Classic game Saturday, University defeated Rossville 58-38.