Greyhound women shake off slow start

Wednesday, November 8, 2006

The final score doesn't show how Fort Scott Community College's women had trouble pulling away from the Ottawa University junior varsity in the first half of the Greyhounds' home opener at Arnold Arena Tuesday night.

Fort Scott, coming off a split in a classic at Moberly, Mo., over the weekend, trailed 12-9 after 5 1/2 minutes but used its transition game to build a 16-point lead at halftime and go on to an 80-47 victory.

The Greyhounds are 2-1. They fell to host Moberly Area Friday night, 71-60, and defeated Southwestern Illinois, 89-48, Saturday.

Ottawa made five of its first eight shots from the field in building its short-lived lead. But the Greyhounds held the Braves to two of 19 the rest of the half.

The defense began creating turnovers -- Ottawa committed 38 in the game, equal to the number of rebounds it had -- and scoring transition baskets from them. What that was okay with Greyhound head coach Kristy Guffey, she also realizes that FSCC will eventually need to start making plays from its offense, not just its transition game.

"Right now, our defense is creating our offense and we've got to make better decisions offensively," Guffey said "We still have too many turnovers for my liking right now. I think we're trying to get higher expectations for our freshmen, get them a little mentally tougher. We need to make better decisions offensively so that once we get to conference, we can run some offense instead of everything coming from our defense."

Sophomore Tiffany Coppage sparked a 10-0 run that ended the half with a three-point shot from the right side with 1:39 remaining. The spurt continued into the second half as Fort Scott came out of the locker room and scored the first seven points, making It 42-19 on Jasmine Hammond's triple.

Hammond, a sophomore, led the 'Hounds with 24 points in their victory over Southwestern Illinois and finished with 12 here. She averaged about six points a game last season but is being counted on for more scoring this year.

"She's a lot more confident this year and I think realizes that she's capable of being an X factor for us this year," Guffey says. "I think Jasmine plays really, really hard. She came on strong at the end of last year. I think she's turned it (around) this year and built on it."

The Greyhounds made nine of their first 10 shots from the field to open the second half and boosted the lead to 54-28 with 13:48 remaining. An 11-0 run later made it 65-32 with 10:50 left.

Keisha Walker, who will sign a letter of intent with Texas Tech this afternoon, led Fort Scott with 20 points. Jazmin Taylor, a freshman, was next with 19 while Coppage had 18.

Allyson Weldy led Ottawa with 15 points with Stef Randa adding 10.

Fort Scott shot 41 percent from the field, making 35 of 86 field-goal attempts. The

OTTAWA JV: Nelson 2-8 0-0 5, Vance 0-8 0-0 0, Randa 4-9 0-0 10, Mueller 2-5 1-2 6, Davis 0-2 5-6 5, Weldy 6-9 3-4 15, Snw 1-3 0-0 2, Wells 1-5 1-2 4. TOTALS: 16-51 10-14 47.

FORT SCOTT: Walker 9-18 1-3 20, Kirkwood 0-2 0-2 0, Taylor 9-19 1-2 19, Hammond 4-10 3-4 12, Coppage 8-21 0-2 18, Colding 0-1 0-0 0, Doss 1-4 0-0 2, English 1-5 1-2 3, Garr 0-1 0-0 0, Bowles 3-5 0-0 6. TOTALS: 35-86 6-15 80.

Halftime: Fort Scott, 35-19.

Three-point field goals: Ottawa JV 5-21 (Randa 2-5, Mueller 1-3, Wells 1-3, Nelson 1-6), Fort Scott 4-17 (Coppage 2-5, Hammond 1-3, Walker 1-4, Taylor 0-5).

Total fouls: Ottawa JV 15, Fort Scott 18. Fouled out: Walker, Bowles. Technical fouls: none.

Rebounds: Ottawa JV 38 (Weldy 9), Fort Scott 55 (Coppage 14). Assists: Ottawa JV 10 (Weldy 4), Fort Scott 11 (Taylor 4). Turnovers: Ottawa JV 38, Fort Scott 22. Steals: Ottawa JV 9 (Mueller 4), Fort Scott 27 (Taylor 7). Blocked shots: Ottawa JV 2 (Vance, Wells), Fort Scottt 1 (Coppage).

'Hounds made 47 percent of their shots in the second half, going 20 of 43. Ottawa finished at 31 percent on 16 of 51.

Fort Scott had 55 rebounds with Coppage hauling down 14 and Walker nine. Freshman Amber Bowles pulled down eight boards.

The Greyhounds turned the ball over 22 times but recorded 27 steals. Taylor had seven of them. Taylor also dished four of Fort Scott's 11 assists.

In Friday's game at Moberly, which is among others receiving votes in the NJCAA's Division I pre-season poll after going to the national tournament last season, Taylor scored 19 points while Coppage added 12. Brittney English had 10 rebounds. But Fort Scott shot only 36 percent from the field on 19 of 53 in the loss.

Four Greyhounds reached double figures Saturday against Southwestern led by Hammond, who made nine of 12 shots from the field and five of seven from three-point range. Coppage also hit five of seven from behind the arc as she finished with 20. Walker and Taylor each scored 14. The 'Hounds made 42 percent of their fielders on 31 of 74 and went 13 of 27 from three-point range.

"We played (against) five sophomores who had much more experience than us," Guffey of Friday's game. "We missed 16 free throws. We shot 32 percent (the first night) and then shot probably 70 percent the second game.

"We have to get more consistently offensively and you could see that tonight in the first half with a poor shooting percentage and then we got better in the second half."

Fort Scott's next game will be Tuesday against the Missouri Valley College junior varsity at Arnold Arena. Tip off will be at 5 p.m. After that game, the 'Hounds won't be home again until November 28 against Brown Mackie.