Totally Tigers … Déjà Vu

​Photos and Story by Mike Gesler

Grant 64   Tri County 25

I could honestly cut and paste Grant’s game against Ravenna this past Tuesday evening to describe tonight’s game against the Vikings of Tri County. The first half was Tiger domination, and the second half was the Tigers using the game to work on improvements and giving all the girls time on the court.

“I think it was kind of a repeat of Tuesday,” Coach Delamater shared. “Not as fresh. Not as crisp. Whether it was tired legs, I mean a lot of things in this week. Three games. Exams this week for the girls. Half day today. So mentally we weren’t as crisp as we should have been. Rotation wasn’t as good as it could have been. I would love to see what our turnovers are because I think they're probably higher than what I would like them to be. But they battled really hard tonight.”

It took only a minute for Jayci Hance to get the Tigers going. The Tigers then sent Tri County’s Allison Johnson to the line who made one of two to get the Vikings on the board. Julie Ashbaugh extended Grant’s count to six before Tri County’s Haylee Dietz made it three for the Vikings. The Tigers would then go on a seventeen point terror. By the close of the first quarter, the Tigers held a twenty-two point margin over the Vikings.

Tri County had their best quarter in the second. Part of that was due to Ashbaugh running into foul trouble and sitting for the remainder of the half. The Vikings added ten to their total as the Tigers adjusted to not having Ashbaugh. Even without their top shooter, a timely three from Jocee Pleune and six from Jayci Hance helped the Tigers add twelve and go into the half with a comfortable twenty-four point margin.

With Ashbaugh back in the game for the third, the Tigers reestablished their dominance which gave them ample opportunity to rotate girls in and improve on aspects of their game that will be needed as they face the upper half of the CSAA and into District play. 

​“They definitely set the pace for the entire game,” stated Coach Delamater. “They definitely set the tempo very, very early that we were going to get up and down the floor and they were going to have to run with us if they wanted to do anything. Even though we didn’t get the turnovers off the press like we normally got, I still thought in half court our defense was pretty good. Everybody rotated in tonight. Some girls gave us good minutes at times. Emma Thompson continues to get better every game in her inside game which is something that we’re really looking for is somebody who can do that. It was nice to see Alexa Obenauf come out tonight and hit a shot. Jocee Pleune played some better offense tonight than we’ve seen from her. We’re really pushing her to get going more on offense. I’m happy with what we saw tonight with all the circumstances surrounding that.”

Julie Ashbaugh and Jayci Hance were both in double digits for the Tigers tonight with eighteen and thirteen respectively. Makalya Zerlaut helped out with eight and Jocee Pleune added six. Danica Gee, Alexa Obenauf, and Reese Gragg each had four tonight. The Tigers will be tested this coming week that could set the stage for an interesting CSAA showdown. They will first travel to Central Montcalm for a Tuesday evening match up before returning home to face Big Rapids on Friday.