Meyer and Alderfer Big In Loss to Little River
On Hawaiian Homecoming Senior Recognition night, Goessel’s Bluebirds saw some good moments against Little River’s Lady Redskins. The Bluebirds used 60% shooting from Stephany Meyer (24 points) and solid rebounding from Liz Alderfer (11) to stay within range of Little River, but went 0 for 12 from beyond the arc and hit only 7 of 19 free throw attempts. Zimmerman hit four treys for the Redskins and McBride put up 16, mostly on layups, to win every quarter and seal the win 52-37.
Nearly everyone including the Bluebird mascot and Coach Hoopes had Hawaiian garb. Coach Hoopes did not sport a grass skirt. Goessel experienced a slow start and quickly went down 8-18 before gaining some traction late in the 1st quarter. Meyer knotted it at 2, then Alderfer put in a crafty inside move, then kept it at 8-15 on a stop and pop off an inbounds set. Stephany was called for a 2nd personal foul at 3:05 but played throughout tonight. Liz Schmucker dished off on the drive to Porclein Unruh for the easy two and Meyer caught a FT carom and jumped it back to the hole. Meyer closed out the high intensity first quarter inside 14-20.
Fans gained hope several times tonight as the Bluebirds looked like they might get back in it. With a great push into the paint, Meyer tallied one of two from the stripe, then caught an excellent in-pass from Alderfer for two more to close to 17-20, but A.D.’s daughter Zimmerman buried one from way downtown to extend again. With repeated pushes inside to Meyer, Goessel used height mis-matches to close back to 21-25, but once again Zimmerman found the range. With time running out Madi Smith was hammered from behind on a three point attempt and hit two of the three charities to close the 9-10 quarter 23-30.
To start the 2nd half, Smith zip-lined one to Meyer then Alderfer found the range inside on a nifty roll to close to 27-36. Timeout Little River 3:41. Schmucker went downhill to the hoop, was fouled and hit one, then Meyer went to the line to close the 6-8 3rd quarter with another charity 29-38. Goessel simply could not close the 5-10 point gap.
There were many tie-ups tonight and Little River rode the Oahu wave to 29-45, using efforts from Zimmerman and McBride. At 2:58, Meyer finally found the hoop, but Goessel’s defensive efforts appeared to be exhausted and the Redskins ran it to 31-51 before all subs came in at 1:27. Prior to that point, Goessel had only mustered one field goal in the 4th quarter, allowing the Redskins to close out the contest with a 13-2 run. Unruh hit two charities, Chloe Smith laced one into Meyer for two and Meyer lolloped another in to close to 37-52 as time expired.
Stephany Meyer showed strong in the paint tonight with 24 and 8 (6 offensive) boards and 3 steals. Liz Alderfer contributed 6 big points and showed huge on the boards with 11. Porclein Unruh scored 4, Madison Smith 2 and Liz Schmucker 1. Also in for Goessel were: Haley O’Neal , Rachael Boese, Rebecca Sawyer, Chloe Smith and Bethany Herrel.
-Karl Brubaker
