S. Range doubles up rival
NORTH LIMA — South Range has the poor economy to thank for the arrival of first-year coach Wayne Johnson.
Johnson, a non-teacher, was an assistant boys coach at Columbiana before becoming the girls head coach for four years. But traveling for his regular job forced him to put the brakes on his coaching.
When the economy went sour, Johnson’s time behind the wheel was reduced significantly.
Then the South Range position opened and Johnson was eager to return to the hardwood.
What Johnson brought was an uptempo style to the Raiders and it paid off Monday night.
“We’re trying to play hard and relentless, to push the tempo and institute this,” Johnson said after Range (10-7, 7-4 ITCL) beat East Palestine, 51-25.
“Our pressure was pretty good tonight,” Johnson said of a full-court version that rattled the Bulldogs, who played without Emily Casto.
“They were missing their point guard and she’s one of the best guards in the league,” Johnson said.
“We thought we could get up and pressure them and control the tempo.”
Emily Seman had 14 points, Ellie Stoffer 11 and Sam Smith 10 for the Raiders, who jumped out to a 17-point halftime lead.
Even in defeat, East Palestine fans should be proud to have a guy like Walt Herriott who wouldn’t use Casto’s absence as an excuse for the lopsided score.
“Give Wayne a lot of credit because he does a heck of a job with his girls,” Herriott said. “I’m not going to use that as an excuse. They just outplayed us.”
Herriott even hesitated before revealing that, by not having his top player, the Bulldogs lost 16 points and between eight and 10 assists per game, and the team’s press-breaker.
South Range’s press resulted in turnovers and affected East Palestine’s shot selection.
Casto was ill and Herriott didn’t find out that she wouldn’t be playing until noon on Monday.
With such late notice, Herriott scrambled to adjust his lineup in preparation for the game.
It all figured into the Bulldogs’ lack of offense due to the missing ballhandler.
Although it was South Range’s second win over the Bulldogs this season — the Raiders won, 56-40, at East Palestine on Jan. 4 — Johnson said the Bulldogs aren’t the same team.
“Casto makes them go,” said Johnson.
“He [Herriott] didn’t know how his girls were going to react without a player who is a four-year starter in the lineup.”
Even so, Johnson wasn’t naive enough to use kid gloves against East Palestine (7-9, 4-7).
That’s why the Raiders were ready to pounce, Casto or no Casto.
“We didn’t take it any other way other than they’re putting five people out on the floor and we’d better be ready to go. Once we got our pressure going, we were comfortable with that,” she said.
Replacing Casto was Paige Peterson.
“She did an admirable job,” Herriott said of Peterson, who had a team-highseven points.
Before the game, Patti Schuster was recognized as South Range’s only senior on Senior Parent Night and received flowers.
Then Schuster, a noted volleyball player, was a starter and grabbed seven rebounds for her team that made 22 of 48 field goals to East Palestine’s 8 of 30.
bassetti@vindy.com