NorthWood Basketball: Black Swish Gift Coach Win At Bremen
BREMEN — Long before tip-off of NorthWood’s girls basketball game at Bremen Thursday night, Black Swish head coach Adam Yoder stood out in the hall with daughter Maddie, going through old team photos looking for himself, his mother, wife Whitney and their siblings.
Bremen was Yoder’s home before he made himself a new one at NorthWood, and for that reason, Thursday’s game with the Lady Lions meant more than the average non-conference contest. After four nip-tuck quarters, the Swish were able to gift their coach — decked out in Christmas-themed attire for Thursday’s game — a shiny, new ‘W’ by a 40-35 final.
“This is my alma mater. I had opportunities to come back here, and I didn’t. I stayed at NorthWood. I wanted to be with these girls,” explained Yoder. “I think they sensed that I was kind of nervous about this. I wanted to make sure that we got a ‘W’ tonight, and they definitely were a little nervous there at the beginning, too. The second half we just made play after play. That was good to see.”
The Lions made a number of plays themselves over a second half that saw four lead changes and five ties, but their guests made just a few more down the stretch.
With the score knotted up at 28-all after three, Kenzie Bergman’s 3-pointer from the wing with 6:22 to go put NorthWood (10-3) out front, and a second triple by Karlie Fielstra on a Maddy Payne inside-out pass pushed the Black Swish out to a 34-30 lead with 5:25 on the clock. With NorthWood still holding onto a tentative, 34-32 lead with just 1:30 remaining, Fielstra returned the favor with a pass inside to Payne, whose post bucket gave her team a little breathing room at 36-32. Payne’s diving rebound on the other end after a well-contested Kaelyn Shively miss from in close gave the visitors back possession, and freshman call-up Kendal Miller essentially sealed the deal, cooly converting two free throws in the bonus with under 25 seconds to go.
“That’s really the first time she’s played any extended minutes in a tight game, and she makes two free throws at the end to ice it,” said Yoder. “I have a lot of faith in Kendal. She’s earned her way onto the varsity, and she’s taking advantage of those minutes now.”
Yoder kept an ace up his sleeve Thursday in Kate Rulli, and the sophomore forward gave her team a big spark off the bench at Bremen. Rulli put up 13 points patrolling the paint, tallying nine of her team-high during a big second stanza. She scored all five of NorthWood’s points taking advantage of a mismatch in the post during a 5-1 quarter-ending run that gave her team a 15-11 halftime advantage.
Rulli gave the credit for that spurt at the end of the second to her teammates in the back court.
“It’s great that our guards and people in the arc are looking inside and noticing that there’s a smaller person on the post,” she said.
“It was the first game we brought her off the bench in awhile, and she’s a team player,” said Yoder of Rulli. “She had some of her more high-scoring games earlier in the year coming off the bench, so it’s something that she was used to doing. Boy, she went in there and battled against (Karlee) Feldman. I thought she battled against Feldman as good as anybody we had tonight, and that’s a good sign going forward.”
While Rulli and Payne did a yeoman’s job defending Feldman, the athletic 6’1” junior still managed game-highs of 18 points and 19 rebounds against NorthWood. She was simply dominant in the third quarter, putting up 12 points — capped off by a 3-pointer from the wing with 41 seconds left in the period — but took just one shot over the decisive fourth frame.
“Karlee plays all over the court. She’s able to do a lot of stuff for us, and in the third quarter she was able to catch it in the post in some great positions where she could just drop step and put it right up,” said Bremen head coach Alex Robinson. “And then there were a few in a row where they made an adjustment. They did it in the first half too where they were fronting her and then they had a defender behind as well. I think our guards a few times they’d get it and they’d recognize that that’s points, and I think they didn’t recognize the shift in the defense in there. And then I don’t know if we got a little gun-shy to go in there as much after that.”
Feldman’s efforts off the glass helped her team to a 35-19 rebounding advantage, but it wasn’t quite enough to make up for the team’s 22 turnovers. The Black Swish, by contrast, surrendered just 10 turnovers, including only four giveaways over the second half.
“One thing we’re working on is protecting the ball and being poised every time you have the ball,” explained Robinson. “I think we just put ourselves in some bad positions. And they play great man-to-man defense: They pressure you, and they don’t make things easy at all. But I think that 14 games into the season, some of those turnovers are unacceptable.”
“I think our ability to take away (Erin) Coffel and Shively — we have so many players that we can put on them — it makes it hard for them to transport the ball and get the ball into Feldman,” said Yoder. “I thought we did an outstanding job on Coffel. She didn’t take many shots, and we didn’t let her take many shots. That’s a credit to Kenzie Bergman and Neely Trenshaw. I think Kendal Miller, the freshman, even had her for awhile so very, very happy with our defensive effort.”
Bergman knocked down a trio of 3s on her way to 10 points behind Rulli’s 13, and Payne notched eight points with five rebounds. Fielstra scored five and passed out four assists in the win.
Dellenira Duran scored six points with an assist, and Shively chipped in four assists and two steals for the home team.
With Thursday’s win, NorthWood bounces back from a 47-34 loss to Fairfield Tuesday, one that snapped a six-game win streak by the Black Swish. They’ll return to play at the eight-team Northridge Tournament Dec. 29-30
Bremen (6-8) lost its fourth straight, meanwhile, part of a tough stretch that’s featured a double-overtime loss to John Glenn and losses to St. Joseph and Mishawaka. The Lions will resume play when they host Central Noble Dec. 29.
“The feeling of being close is not a good feeling. Aside from Mishawaka we’ve been very competitive in this stretch. We’ve been close and just haven’t been able to get over the hump,” Robinson said. “It’s great to compete, and it is a tough stretch in our schedule but we would love for a breakthrough to be coming. A lot of our season goals are still ahead of us. It’s not the end of the world, but I hope the players — and I think they are and I know we are — getting sick of those ‘you were close but couldn’t quite get the job done.’”