It wasn’t Aberdeen Roncalli’s most pristine effort of the season, but the Cavaliers managed to pull off a 53-34 Northeast Conference girls’ basketball victory over Tiospa Zina Tuesday night at the Roncalli Gym.
With the victory the Cavaliers improved to 4-0 at home this season.
Roncalli was plagued by turnovers and a poor shooting percentage in the first half, but pulled away to lead 30-16 at the break.
“I thought we went through the motions tonight,” said Roncalli coach Derek Larson. “We did this (Monday) in practice. Didn’t have a very good practice, kind of just went through the motions. And we did the same thing tonight. We’re obviously not a great rebounding team, because we’re not very big. We turned it over quite a few times on the offensive end. Didn’t value the basketball. And I thought we didn’t take very good quality shots, especially in the first half.”
The Cavaliers turned a bit of a corner in the third period, then rode the cushion to the final buzzer.
“The third quarter was much different. We did a better job valuing the ball and doing the little things,” Larson said. “Fourth quarter, I thought we reverted back to taking quick shots early in the possession.”
Claire Crawford led the way offensively for Roncalli with 13 points, half of which came in the third quarter. Ava Hanson added 10 points and Maddie Huber had eight.
Alexia Quinn notched 12 points for the Wambdi, the bulk of which came in the third quarter. Kenadee Bissonette added nine points for Tiospa Zina.
“We had opportunity to do some of those things on the defensive end and dictate the game,” Larson said, “and we kind of let them do what they wanted.”
Roncalli will head to Clark-Willow Lake in Clark on Thursday.
TIOSPA ZINA (4-7): Lattice Rodlund 1 0-0 3, Alexia Quinn 5 1-2 12, Hannah Ziegler 1 0-0 3, Kennadee Bissonette 4 1-2 9, Myah Deutsch 2 0-0 4, Talia Robertson 1 0-0 3. Totals 14 2-4 34.
ABERDEEN RONCALLI (6-3): McKenna O’Keefe 3 0-0 6, Camryn Bain 2 2-4 7, Maddie Huber 3 0-2 8, Claire Crawford 6 0-0 13, Ava Hanson 4 0-0 10, Rylee Voeller 2 2-2 7, Reese Henrich 1 0-0 2. Totals 21 4-8 53.
Tiospa Zina 7 16 26 34
Aberdeen Roncalli 13 30 48 53
3-point field goals – Rodlund, Quinn, Ziegler, Robertson; Bain, Huber 2, Crawford, Hanson 2, Voeller. Total Fouls – Tiospa Zina 7; Aberdeen Roncalli 6.
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