Minford moves to finals

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NEW BOSTON – Four teams, two days, with two games each day, that’s the Glenwood Holiday Classic, which tipped off Monday evening in New Boston, Ohio. The opening game pitted the Minford Lady Falcons up against the Wellston Golden Rockets.

Scott Caudill’s Lady Falcons showed up to prove a point Monday night, as they dominated the Golden Rockets throughout the entirety of the contest. Wellston’s offense struggled all night against the Minford defense, which limited Wellston to only scoring double figures in one quarter, the fourth.

Minford senior Abby Grasso led the Lady Falcons in scoring Monday night, in what was one of the best games of her career. Her 20 point night, could have easily been more, had she played the final quarter of the game.

Two other Lady Falcons also reached double digits in scoring against Wellston. Erin Daniels finished the night with 12 points, and was a perfect four for four from the free throw line. Like Grasso, Daniels sat the fourth quarter.

Ashley Blankenship had a big night for Minford as well, scoring 10 points, eight of which came in the fourth quarter.

The Minford defense completely shut down Wellston in the third and first few minutes of the fourth quarters. On six consecutive possessions, the Lady Falcons recorded seven blocks on the Golden Rockets. Four of those blocks came by way of Blankenship.

The Lady Falcons set up a no-fly zone for the Golden Rockets, who were held scoreless for 6:35 seconds spanning the end of the third quarter into the first two minutes of the fourth.

Caudill was extremely pleased with the way his team performed Monday night against Wellston, in their 61-28 win.

“It was a great team win for us,” Caudill said. “Everyone shared the ball phenomenally. (Abby) Grasso had a great shooting night, and Erin (Daniels) had a great passing night.”

Ali Hammond and Marissa Risner didn’t shoot as well as they normally do, according to Caudill, but he said they were lights out on defense.

“They defended really well,” Caudill said. “They made up for it big time on the defensive end.”

Caudill added there wasn’t a single girl he wasn’t proud of Monday night.

“We did what we needed to do,” Caudill said. “We worked on our halfcourt offense, we did that. We wanted to work on our halfcourt defense, we did that. Just overall, it was a fantastic team win.”

Everything wasn’t perfect for Minford, as Caudill said his team did allow several uncontested shots.

“A lot of their open shots came from miscommunication,” Caudill said. “We got out of rotation, and didn’t rotate the way we were supposed to rotate, and they got wide open uncontested shots. When they got those, they hit them.”

The third quarter was Minford’s best quarter overall on defense. Wellston was limited to a single three point field goal and one made free throw the entire quarter.

The Lady Falcons will go on to face the Rock Hill Redwomen in the championship game of the Glenwood Holiday Classic, after they defeated the hosts, Glenwood Lady Tigers.

Box Score

1 2 3 4 Final
Minford 12 14 18 17 61
Wellston 4 7 4 13

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Individual Statistics

Minford – Grasso 8-2-20. Daniels 4-4-12, Blankenship 5-0-10, Risner 2-2-7, Puckett 1-1-3, Doll 1-0-3, Hammond 1-0-2, Watters 1-0-2

3-point field goals – Minford 4 (Grasso 2, Risner, Doll)

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By Michael Hamilton

[email protected]

Reach Michael Hamilton at 740-353-3101, ext 1931, or on Twitter @MikeHamilton82.

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