Mounties ready for tough sectional opener
Codey Emerson
codey@jrpress.com
The girls basketball post-season officially gets underway on Tuesday across the state of Indiana. For the Southmont Mounties they’re all set to open up play in the Class 2A Sectional 44 at Greencastle. South ended the regular season with a 11-10 overall record, a two win improvement over last season.
The Lady Mounties get a re-match of the opening game of the 2022-23 season on Tuesday when they take on the host Tiger Cubs. In that season-opening game way back on Nov. 1, South was able to pick up a 40-37 win over Greencastle. Since that loss, Greencastle went on to lose just three more games the rest of the way as they finished 19-4 which is their best mark since their 18-win season in 2015-16.
Southmont coach Dan Burkman knows in order to win a sectional title, his team would likely have to go through the Tiger Cubs one way or another.
“I’m of the mindset to just get the tough game out of the way,” he said. “We’ve gone over the gameplan now and have really fined tuned it. They’re all buying into it and we really like how it’s shaping out. We believe if we come out and execute it and play a little better offensively, we’ll come out on top.”
The primary reason for the success of the Tiger Cubs stems from one of the elite scorers in the state in senior Gloria Brewer. Her 26.3 points per game rank fourth in the state and she grabs 11.5 rebounds to go along with five steals. While not many teams have been able to stop Brewer, Burkman and the Mounties do pose a threat with their stout defense.
“With a player like that, you have to make her uncomfortable and that’s what we plan to do,” Burkman said. “You’re not going to keep a girl like that down completely but we can’t let her go crazy and we’re going to do everything we can to not let that happen.”
Southmont themselves has a pretty good player in junior point guard DeLorean Mason. Mason averages 13.6 points per game and she ended the regular season leading the state in steals with 6.7 a contest. Senior Chelsea Veatch adds eight points a game for the Mounties with Chloe Jenkins right there as well with 7.9 points and grabbing 9.6 rebounds.
The Mounties ended the regular season winning five out of their last seven games. All coaches want to have their teams playing their best at this point in the season and Burkman believes his team is doing just that.
“I really do think we are playing our best when we need to,” he said. “That game against Crawfordsville I saw a side of us that I hadn’t seen all year. All of our girls are going to have to step up when their number is called.”
The game between the Mounties and Tiger Cubs gets underway on Tuesday at 7 pm at Greencastle. The winner will advance to Friday’s sectional semi-final where they will take on Cloverdale.
