The Hampton-Dumont-CAL girls basketball team had a frustrating night on both ends of the floor, as they fell 59-15 at Clear Lake in their North Central Conference opener on Friday, as aired on 104.9 KLMJ.
Clear Lake, with success from distance early, built up a 16-3 lead through one quarter. The Lion defense kept the Bulldog offense out of rhythm with a full court press in the second quarter. The Lions transition offense was able to feed off that as they increased their lead to 34-7 at the break. The Bulldogs scored their most points in a quarter on the night in the third with seven points. The Lions led 48-14 heading to the fourth. The Lions outscored the Bulldogs 11-1 to close out the game in the fourth. The Bulldogs, when they broke press, set up quality mid-range looks, but couldn’t take the lid off the basket. Head Coach Miranda Stafford says she was proud that her team didn’t quit.
“The way the girls stayed composed. I told them after the game, as competitors it’s really easy to kind of quit in situations like that. There was no quitting from them, they fought. They were diving on the floor and they were playing hard. I was proud of that,” says Stafford. “They’ve got a good team. They’ve got kids that can shoot. When you have three-point shooters that can shoot the ball and you’ve got a six-four post inside, it’s hard to pick your poison. Where you’re gonna go with it. How are you gonna defend. They’ve got a good thing going. We obviously struggled to put the ball in the basket a little bit. I was proud of the way the girls played and how hard they played.”
MacKenzy Valley delivered seven points and Madison Heilskov added five points to lead the Bulldogs.
Hampton-Dumont-CAL (1-2, 0-1 NCC) will host Dike-New Hartford in non-conference on Tuesday. It will air on 104.9 KLMJ and RadioOnTheGo’s YouTube channel.
