Basketball Update February 4
By Ron Haramia
Girls teams try to gain some �mo
With the announcement of the sectional pairings, area girls basketball teams will now attempt to build some momentum the last week of the regular season in preparation for the playoffs.
NorthWood�s loss to Warsaw last Saturday took them out of a three-way tie for second in the Northern Lakes Conference. That leaves Plymouth and Wawasee still knotted with identical 4-2 NLC records heading into the final league game. Plymouth defeated the Lady Warriors in double overtime on Jan. 25. After a non-conference game at New Prairie Tuesday, the Lady Pilgrims travel to Goshen on Thursday while Wawasee visits cellar-dweller Northridge.
Plymouth, winners of five of their last six games will host one of the Class 3A sectionals beginning Tuesday, Feb. 11. Look for the Pilot Sports� full preview of the teams and players next Monday.
Northern State Conference deadlocked
With both Triton and Bremen winning over the weekend, both teams remain tied at 5-1 atop the NSC standings.
Bremen defeated New Prairie one week to the day after beating the Lady Cougars to win the Bi-County championship. The Lady Lions must win at Jimtown Saturday for at least a share of the conference title.
One of the reasons for Bremen�s success this year has to be the difficulty of its schedule. Tuesday, the Lady Lions will play Wawasee, one of seven non-conference teams they have played with winning records. In fact, the nine non-NSC teams on their schedule have won 105 games this year. There is not much the Lady Lions have not seen.
Triton cannot afford to look ahead to their last conference game Friday night at LaVille. Sure a win gives them a share of the trophy (they defeated Bremen back on Dec. 13), but a marquee match-up awaits them at home Thursday night.
Due to the success of their volleyball team, the No. 13 (Class 2A) Lady Trojans meet No. 6 (Class A) Oregon-Davis Feb. 6 instead of when they were originally scheduled to play (Nov. 16).
Knox will entertain New Prairie�s girls team Friday night at 6:30 as part of a girl/boy varsity doubleheader. The last time the Lady Redskins played the front end of a DH at home they went four overtimes with LaVille.
Glenn will try to make amends for a Bi-County loss when they host Culver Friday night.
More Northland news
Taking some of O-D�s attention away from Triton will be a home game against Northland foe South Central (3-1 NAC) Tuesday night.
Argos (4-1 NAC) locked up second place in the conference with a convincing 32-point victory over last place Westville. The win broke a four-game losing streak and now the Lady Dragons will look to end their season with a two-game winning streak when they travel to Bethany Christian for their last regular season game Thursday night.
Eagles stop skid
The Culver Girls Academy Lady Eagles ended a seven-game losing streak this past weekend by defeating Elkhart Baptist. Star forward Vanessa Jackson scored 19 of her team�s 41 points in the victory.
Pilgrim boys play own version of Survivor
The Plymouth boys basketball team will get somewhat of a reprieve from the brutally tough Northern Lakes Conference as they play four of their next six games against non-conference teams.
That is not to say that LaVille (there Wed., Feb. 5), Culver Academy, SB St. Joseph�s and Glenn will be pushovers, but the Pilgrims have lost eight of their last nine against teams with a combined record of 71-29. South Bend Adams (12-4) was the only team during that time that was not a member of the NLC.
To give an example of how tough this year�s conference is, look at normally strong teams like Warsaw and NorthWood. The Tigers are in the middle of the pack at 3-2 (8-5 overall) and the Panthers are in sixth place.
Plymouth completes conference play with two home games - versus first-place Goshen this Friday night, then against arch-rival Warsaw on Thursday, Feb. 13.
Knox in the NSC hunt
Now that New Prairie (4-0) has disposed of Bremen (3-1) for top billing in the Northern State Conference, the Cougars must not become overconfident. Knox, 4-1 and winner of eight games in a row (12-4 overall) gets the next crack at NP this Friday. A Redskin victory makes things very interesting with only one other conference game (vs. Triton) left to keep Knox (12-4, 4-1 NSC) from winning the title.
The Lions will lick their wounds by trying to get back to their winning ways at home against NSC and sectional opponent Jimtown this Friday. After a home non-conference game Saturday versus Rochester, the Lions will finish up league play at Triton next week. If everything goes right, they still have an outside chance of a share of the title.
Argos� success continues
The Trojans are the next team taking a shot at the 2nd-ranked (Class A) Argos Dragons (15-1) tomorrow night in Argos. Triton hits the road again Saturday to face LaVille.
Sectional opponent Caston awaits the Dragons Saturday. Argos will be looking for a little payback to the Comets, who knocked the Dragons out of the playoffs last year.
Culver Academy entertains two pretty decent teams this weekend - North Miami (9-5) Friday and Pioneer (8-5) Saturday.
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