Newcastle ladies are halfway there
Sonja Karp
NLJ Sports Reporter
The Lady Dogies weathered the latest wintry blast on Saturday as they traveled to Buffalo for a rematch against the Lady Bison. Though the score once again gave the Johnson County team a decisive victory, head coach Chad Ostenson’s squad cut the margin of defeat from 44 points in the first contest to 25 this weekend.
“I was pretty pleased with our defensive game,” Ostenson nodded. “We held them to only 44 points, and held their leading scorer to 11.”
The Lady Dogies went toe-to-toe with the number two-ranked team in the state for half of the contest, outscoring them 15-12 in the second quarter and coming up short by only one point in the third. However, a scoreless first quarter and a 14-2 run by Buffalo in the fourth culminated in the 19-44 loss for Newcastle.
“It’s pretty hard to get things going offensively when you only put up four shots like we did in the first quarter,” Ostenson began. “Then we worked so hard in the second and third quarters to try to dig ourselves out of the hole, that we just couldn’t keep up with them in the fourth.”
Turnovers and offensive rebounds were once again the story of the game. Newcastle committed 35 turnovers to Buffalo’s 22 and only brought down three offensive rebounds to their 20. In essence, those numbers alone gave the Lady Bison 55 more opportunities to put the ball in the hoop throughout the course of the contest.
“With that many second chance opportunities, to only give up 44 points isn’t bad at all,” Ostenson stated. “We had way too many turnovers, but they had their press on for most of the night. We finally got to where we could handle it alright, and get it up the court but by then the damage had been done.”
The Bison held a 15-0 lead at the end of the first frame, but in the second quarter, Newcastle settled down and took much better care of the basketball and began to attack the basket.
Then in the third quarter, it was once again a tightly contested, defensive ball game that ended in a 3-2 scoring margin with Buffalo just edging out the Lady Dogies.
Unfortunately, Ostenson’s crew just didn’t have the gas to keep up with the relatively fresh legs of the Bison who rotated 10 players throughout the night. That fatigue showed as Buffalo was able to extend their 13 point lead to 25 in the final eight minutes of play.
“The ball started going in the hoop there in the second quarter, and after a couple shots fell, we started to get a little confidence,” Ostenson nodded. “I called a time out early in the third quarter and got after them a little bit, reminding them we didn’t need the usual third quarter blues, and that seemed to have lit a fire. We didn’t score a lot, but we didn’t give up much either, so that was good.”
As the Lady Dogies turn their sights to their final weekend of regular season play, there is much riding on the Thursday night matchup against the Thermopolis Lady Bobcats, which was postponed last Friday due to weather. The last time these two teams met, Newcastle pulled out their first win of the season, and set themselves up to claim the three seed in the Northeast Quadrant. While Ostenson is confident his team will hold on to that seeding win or lose, a win will solidify the spot without having to resort to a tie-breaker.
The Lady Dogies will be honoring the senior members of the team on Thursday, and then will host the number one-ranked Lady Bearcats of Douglas in the last home game of the season on Friday.
They will wrap up their regular season on the road against Wheatland, and though it isn’t a quadrant game, the outcome of that contest will also be important as the team prepares to travel to Wheatland again next week for the 3A East Regional Tournament.
“We have a lot of work to do in a short week of practice, and we will be focusing on taking care of the ball and rebounding,” Ostenson determined. “It will be a good test for us to play three in a row, because we’re hoping to go at least three at Regionals. And, these could be three of the teams we will see next weekend as well.”