Knights get defensive in 58-21 rout of Essex

Fremont-Mills used its smothering defense to force 11 first quarter turnovers and 25 for the game in a 58-21 victory over Essex in Corner Conference girls basketball Friday in Tabor.

“That’s what we want to hang our hat on, being able to play defense,” said Fremont-Mlls coach Brett Weldon after the game. “We’re all kind of the same size so we can play man and switch and make it difficult on teams. Our next step is we have to progress to being able to turn them over and convert those. We get going too fast (on offense).”

Whether it was with their full-court press or halfcourt defense, the Knights (2-0) never let the Trojanettes (2-3) get comfortable. For the game, the Trojanettes shot 20 percent from the field – 6-of-30 – and didn’t crack double-figures until the third quarter.

“We had too many turnovers and bad passes tonight,” said Essex coach Logan Sampers. “Stuff we have to clean up.”

The Knights did turn many of those live ball turnovers into fast break chances – even if they didn’t always convert those easy buckets the way their coach wanted. F-M shot 37.3 percent from the field – 19-of-51 – and had 17 turnovers of their own.

“It’s just one of those things where we preach going fast and they do but we have to just be able to slow ourselves down and do a jump stop and find a teammate or go off two feet,” Weldon said. “It’s just one of those things where we’re early in the season and I hope we can improve with that.”

Ella Thornton led three Knights in double-figures with 15 points. Izzy Weldon added 11 and Bella Gute 10. Fremont-Mills also hit seven three’s as a team and 13-of-20 free throws.

“We have girls that can shoot,” Weldon said. “Any given night they can hit four or five threes, I’m pretty confident in that. I thought we did a better job scoring inside in the first quarter of our high post action because teams are going to zone us and we have to be able to work against that in the high post and get the kickouts.”

Brooke Burns scored 16 of the Trojanette’s 21 points on the night.

Despite the lopsided score, Sampers was proud of his team’s effort.

“We preach every day to play hard to the end,” he said. “They did that. They played hard to the end.”

Bedford 49,
Essex 32

Bedford blew open a 10-10 game with a 20-11 second quarter run en route to a 49-32 victory over Essex in non-conference girls basketball last Tuesday.

Brooke Burns scored 18 points and grabbed six rebounds for Essex.

Lexi Perkins led Bedford with 14 points and 19 rebounds.

Fremont-Mills 80,
Heartland Christian 7

Fremont-Mills opened the game on a 21-3 run and cruised to an 80-7 victory over Heartland Christian in non-conference girls basketball last Monday.

Ella Thornton scored 13 points to lead four Knights in double-figures. Bella Gute added 12 points and Ryleigh Ewalt and Izzy Weldon chipped in 10 points each.

The Knights shot 50 percent from the field (35-of-70) in the win while holding a 26 to 19 rebounding edge. Defensively they forced 43 turnovers and held the Eagles to 12.5 percent shooting – 3-of-24 – from the field.

Noel Cramer scored all of Heartland Christian’s points.