Liberty speed downs Hubbard

By Jon moffett

jmoffett@vindy.com

LIBERTY

John Hritz said he didn’t exactly lose sleep over the Hubbard team that would visit his Liberty girls basketball team on Monday. And he didn’t really have nightmares about it either. But he did say he was plenty worried about it.

Having come off a major win against powerhouse Struthers, Hritz didn’t want to see his Leopards let up against a more than capable Eagles team.

But there was no letdown as Liberty prevailed in a 54-39 victory.

Well, not a total letdown.

“I’ll tell you what, personally I think it was a little bit of a letdown coming after such a big win against Struthers, and that’s what I was afraid of,” Hritz said. “You have to take your hat off to Hubbard.

“They came out and played a great ball game. Their gameplan was to slow us down, and it almost worked. Our speed kind of pulled out of this dilemma a little bit.”

Slowing the team down is easier said than done. While the team might be a little undersized, the Leopards (7-4, 3-0 All-American Conference White Tier) make up for it with their quickness and speed.

Three players scored in the double figures for Liberty. Leading the pack was senior Bianca Rozenblad, who had a game-high 19 points. Behind her was Vakeyla Merriweather with 14 and Mindy Dykes with 12.

Rozenblad said it wasn’t easy to defend the Eagles (4-7, 0-3) but the Liberty team speed made it possible to run the offense.

“Coach told us to capitalize on our quickness and make sure we have good ball movement,” Rozenblad said. “They slowed us down toward the end, so we had to pick it up.

“Our quickness played into our game really well,” she added. “We get the ball downcourt quickly. We have Kandace [Coward] as our center, but the rest of us are really guards.”

Dykes said Hubbard deserved credit for limiting the Liberty offense to just 26 points in the first half. The Eagles, who had 16 at halftime, focused on trying to shut down the potent scorers.

“I think we played a good game tonight because they were trying to slow us down and shut us down,” she said. “But we had to pick up the pace because we knew they weren’t going to let us do what we wanted.”

The Eagles stormed out in the third quarter and had 14 points. But Liberty was able to adjust and also put in 14 third-quarter points.

Hubbard coach Ross Stoffer gave credit to Liberty and Hritz, who lead the conference.

“We played really hard and did pretty well against their pressure,” he said. “So I was proud of that. But they got some transition baskets late in the game, and they are very well coached.”

Rozenbland and Dykes said if the Leopards can play up to their potential, the sky is the limit when it comes to winning the conference.