VEEDERSBURG — Fountain Central girls basketball are still finding ways to win games despite not playing their best basketball. Tuesday was another instance of that as the Mustangs were able to hang on late against the Chargers who gave FC all they could handle. FC led 10-2 after a quarter and things looked grim for the Chargers who even trailed by as many as 13 when FC had it a 17-4. After taking a 20-12 lead into halftime, the third quarter belonged to Charger junior Piper Ramey who scored all six Charger points in the quarter. Still trailing 25-18 North needed one more run. With 4:27 left they cut the lead to just three, but six straight by the host Mustangs made it 33-25 with time ticking away.
With the win FC improves to 8-2 on the season and even more impressively, the remain perfect on their home floor (7-0). It’s something that Mustang coach Sam Karr will take heading into the Holiday break.
“We’ve struggled to score the ball at points this year and have had to really rely on our defense,” Karr said. “If there’s a knock on us right now it’s that we’re not consistent enough on offense just yet. When we find a rotation that works for us, I think you’ll see our points per game start to go up.”
Like the Mustangs, the Charger defense has also kept them in games this season. In the loss to the Mustangs, Charger coach Ryan Nuppnau noted how it wasn’t anything major that his team did wrong, but more of multiple small mistakes. At the end of the night, he was proud of the effort that his team put forth.
“I told them that I was proud of them for how they fought back after getting down early. We tied them in the second and out-scored them in the third and fourth quarters. With having such a young team like we do and fighting back against a very good Fountain Central team, we could’ve easily folded right away but we didn’t. If we don’t go 7-14 from the free-throw line and limit them to one less three, we likely win the game. We talk about putting together a complete 32 minutes and these girls are getting great in-game experience on learning how to do that.”
FC ended the game shooting 12-46 (26%) from the floor in the win. They made 5-19 (26%) from beyond the three point line and went 6-10 from the foul line. They grabbed 21 rebounds and only turned the ball over six times. Hannah Prickett led the Mustangs with 12 points while Rylee Simko scored nine.
North for the night shot 10-24 (42%) and 3-8 from three and as Nuppnau said 7-14 from the free throw line. They grabbed 31 rebounds but did turn the ball over 23 times. Junior Piper Ramey continued her strong season with 17 points with Blair Nichols chipping in eight.
Both teams will take some rest for the holiday’s as the Mustangs will be back in action next Tuesday for a trip to Delphi . The Chargers (4-4) are also back in action next Tuesday when they welcome Faith Christian.
Fountain Central 35, North Montgomery 30
Score By Quarter
NM 2 10 6 12 — 35
FC 10 10 5 10 — 30
North Montgomery (4-4): FG-FGA FT-FTA PTS: Ella McManomy 0-0 0-0 0, Mady Holt 0-2 0-0 0, Piper Ramey 6-8 4-10 17, Macee Norman 0-6 2-2 2, Sophie Crum 1-2 0-0 2, Blair Nichols 3-4 0-1 8, Caelyn Carpenter 0-0 0-0 0, Krestyn Bradford 0-1 1-2 1; Totals 10-24 7-14 30
Fountain Central (8-2): Rylee Simko 3-8 1-2 9, Brailey Hoagland 0-6 0-0 0, Henley Good 1-7 3-4 6, Hannah Prickett 5-12 0-0 12, Bella Bacon 2-5 0-2 4, Kacey Kirkpatrick 1-8 2-2 4; Totals 12-46 6-10 35
3-Point Shooting: NM 3-8 (Nichols 2, Ramey); FC 5-19 (Prickett 2, Simko 2, Good)
Rebounds: NM 31 (Norman 11, Ramey 7, Holt 4); FC 21 (Kirkpatrick 6)
Turnovers: NM 23; FC 6
