Goessel Girls' Season Ends at Elyria
Goessel Girls Varsity Basketball Elyria Christian v. Goessel February 26, 2020
Goessel’s varsity Bluebird girls faced Elyria on February 4 and won two quarters against the Eagles, but still fell 21-32. In tonight’s matchup in the first round of the Goessel 1A Regional, the 3-16 Blue were up against the same 9-10 Elyria Christian squad away at the Eagle eyrie. Goessel’s defense picked up tonight, but the Eagles’ stifling pressure was too much for the Bluebird ball-handlers. The home-standing Eagles led 11-2 after one quarter and 18-4 at the half; a strong Bluebird 5-3 4th quarter closed this one out 30-14. Seniors Liz Alderfer and Porclein Unruh completed their Bluebird basketball careers with 5 points and 2 points, respectively.
It was an unusual Wednesday night basketball evening in Kansas; Goessel was introduced as the Bluejays and the home announcer apologized indicating it would be OK to introduce the Eagles as the Eager Sparrows at Goessel tomorrow night. An unofficial fan poll showed that official Butch won the “best hair” prize with his Kenny Rogers “do”; it was also announced that, according to a poll of all student workers handling concessions at Elyria, the Eagle concession stand won “best in the Wheat State league.” Goessel’s guys’ team cleaned the concession stand out of pretzels. Goessel played cover-1 on 5’8” Sophomore Kylee Penner, then moved to a collapsing man which proved to be effective clogging up the lane. Freshman Ryland Hawkinson came off the bench to score 7 of the first 11 for Elyria. There was great fan noise, the guys’ varsity team at one point sounded like a flock of 17 distraught Canadian geese caught in a Twilight Zone FFA welding project. With 2:00 to go, Alderfer caught a great in-pass from Liz Schmucker to keep it at 6-2 but after one quarter it was 11-2.
Goessel’s cheer team led the assembled fans in wonderful support for the Blue. At 6:00 minutes, Goessel showed great patience and finally were able to work into Bethany Herrel, who turned and dropped one in off the glass 11-4. Moments later, however, Penner socked one in from pretty near Inman and it was 16-4. Herrel was credited with a nifty steal and Goessel had several nice defensive stops to its credit, but simply could not convert at the opposite end and the 2-7 quarter ended the half at 18-4.
At 5:30 Liz Alderfer set and delivered spectacularly from just beyond the outstretched leaning snowman arm at the Guhr residence, causing the snowman to tilt ever more precariously. Rachael Zogleman was credited with a nice stop and with 1:30 left the Blue pushed patiently inside to Porclein Unruh, who posted up and got one to drop from close range. 9-24. The 5-9 quarter ended 9-27.
In the 4th quarter, Goessel led off with one possession where there were at least three block/deflections, and the Bluebirds turned up the defensive thermostat. The Eagles pushed their lead to 9-29, the largest of the night. At 2:34, Lizzie Schmucker was left open at the top of the circle and buried one from somewhere in the middle of the glowing lights of the nearby McPherson refinery. Immediately, Coach Hoopes called timeout at 2:34; Freshman Sarah Spurlin used aggressive D to flip a turnover and ran coast to coast for the lay-in to close to 14-29. Goessel won the 4th quarter tonight 5-3 with great defense, allowing only one field goal.
Goessel finishes its season; the theme this year was “Building the Bridge.” With only two Seniors, this young team will have a chance to “bridge” the learnings of the past with those who played a great deal this year and those who will be joining the team in the future.
Senior Liz Alderfer led Bluebird scorers with 5, Junior Liz Schmucker 3, Senior Porclein Unruh 2, Junior Bethany Herrel had 2 and Freshman Sarah Spurlin put up 2. Also playing tonight in the final game of the 19-20 season were Freshman Riley Graber, Sophomore Emily Flaming, Sophomore Kaleigh Guhr, Sophomore Alyssa Boden, sophomore Lyna McCombs-Lehrman and Sophomore Rachael Zogleman. Congratulations on working hard, Bluebirds! Thank you coaches Ryan Hoopes and Brooke Bumgarner!
Karl Brubaker
