TINA L. SCOTT
EDITOR
On Saturday, Jan. 30, the Merrill Bluejay Girls Basketball team headed to Stevens Point to battle the Panthers on the court. “In the first half, Zoey Fink went off for 15, all from her 5 made 3 point shots,” said Coach Adam Smith. “Although we gave up those open looks, we were able to keep it a 5 point ball game at half.”
The first half of the game had the Panthers leading 31 to the Bluejays 26.
“As we came out the second half, Point was able to pull away a little further, but late we answered the call and took the lead with less than a minute left in the game,” Coach Smith said. Unfortunately, the final score was Merrill 57 – Stevens Point 61. “We were unable to hold them off in the end,” Coach said. “Although we didn’t come out on top, I was proud of our team’s performance. We battled the whole game and put ourselves in a position to win the game. This was one of those weird days, mixed into a very weird year. We traveled down for a varsity only night and were unable to have our own fans in the building. Our girls adapted well, and we look forward to getting another shot at them on Friday, Feb. 5.”
Despite missing the win by four points, Courtney Krueger (9 FG, 1 3pt, 1 FT, 1 ast, 3 stl) put up 20 points, followed by Claire Drew (3 FG, 1 3pt, 2 FT, 7 ast, 1 stl) and Erin Murray (9 FG, 1 3pt, 2 ast) who each put up 9 points of their own.
Box Score
Merrill 57 @
Stevens Point 61
Coach Smith added: “Last night was the seeding meeting for our regional and it ended with the following:
1. Mosinee
2. Merrill
3. Lakeland
4. Medford
5. Rhinelander
6. Wausau East”
On Friday night, Jan. 29, the DC Everest Evergreen Girls Basketball team traveled to Merrill to take on the Bluejays. This time Claire Drew (5 FG, 3 3pt, 8 FT, 2 ast, 1 stl) put up 21 points to lead the Lady Jays to victory. Courtney Krueger (3 FG, 8 FT, 5 ast, 3 stl) was charged up and put up 14 points, and Crystal Dearth (4 FG, 1 3pt, 1 ast) came in hot with 9 points to offer.
“With Senior night, I figured we would come out with some energy, and we had a pretty good start to the game,” Coach Smith said. “We talked before the game, as to how this was going to be a game of a lot of runs and how they are a similar team to us. We just need to limit their runs and stay disciplined and play our game. We did just that for most of the game.”
“Speaking of runs,” he added, “Probably the deciding factor of the game was the run we went on in the beginning of the second half, going 4 straight possessions with 4 3s to build our lead to 15. They would chip away at that lead, and get it down to 5, but we had enough to hang on.”
“It was great having Crystal back and was again very nice to see scoring coming from multiple members of the team,” Smith said. “Claire went off again for her 3rd 20 or more point game. She has really stepped up this season and has been a deciding factor in many of our games.”
Box Score
DC Everest 52 @
Merrill 61