{"id":21591,"date":"2024-11-16T05:21:51","date_gmt":"2024-11-16T10:21:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/?p=21591"},"modified":"2024-11-17T06:15:06","modified_gmt":"2024-11-17T11:15:06","slug":"balanced-braves-scoring-avenges-23-loss-to-woodlan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/2024\/11\/16\/balanced-braves-scoring-avenges-23-loss-to-woodlan\/","title":{"rendered":"Balanced Braves scoring avenges ’23 loss to Woodlan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A year ago, the Bellmont Braves were simply not ready to take on Woodlan away from home just a week after losing in the volleyball state finals. They lost that game 43-38 before going on a seven-game win streak as center Hailey Cole worked her way back to health from an injury sustained in those State Finals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Mary Bleke knocked down a pair of shots in the first quarter for Bellmont after scoring seven in the opening quarter of the JV contest. (Photo by Tara Riehm)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Fast forward to this season and the Braves were ready Friday night to erase that loss from their minds with a game on their home court with a team that is meshing and maturing quickly despite a very new team dynamic. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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All of this was on full display Friday night in front of the next generation of players on “Youth Night” at the Teepee in Decatur as Bellmont build a first-half lead and showed their depth by extending it further in the second half en route to a 60-38 victory over the Warriors. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bellmont’s abundance of youth has caused many following this Braves team to track a new stat this season – quarters played. Head coach Andy Heim has a large contingent of girls getting major minutes in one or two quarters of the JV game early this season before saving their remaining quarters for the varsity contest. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So far, Heim’s math and plan are working out perfectly. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Kate Kitson provided an early spark to the game for the home team. (Photo by Tara Riehm)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Kate Kitson knocked down a couple of threes in the opening quarter and freshmen twins Mary and Ashley Bleke each got on the board early to give the Braves a 17-11 lead. Mary dominated down low in the first quarter of the JV game, scoring seven points in her cameo before resting for the varsity game. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Emily Bleke (shown below) got into the scoring column in the second quarter with a three, but the game slowed down a bit before half. Bleke finished with a team-high 13 points. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Coming out of the locker rooms at halftime with an 11-point lead, the Braves got Emily Bleke and Kaitlyn Barton to the line for some free throws and added to their lead. Barton also had a good first JV quarter before saving her minutes for the varsity contest. She finished with three points after knocking down 3 of 4 at the line. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Ashley Bleke reached double digits in scoring again with a three in the third quarter. (Photo by Tara Riehm)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

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The offense ran through Lanie French in the fourth quarter, with the sophomore scoring ten of her eleven points in the final stanza. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Lanie French went to work on Woodlan in the fourth quarter, scoring ten of her eleven points on the night. (Photo by Tara Riehm)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Braves will have a three-game week next week, playing Dwenger at home on Tuesday before going to Jay County on Friday, then returning home for Alumni Night Saturday against Heritage. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A year ago, the Bellmont Braves were simply not ready to take on Woodlan away from home just<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21600,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[41,13,15,26],"class_list":["post-21591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-basketball","tag-bellmont","tag-featured","tag-sports"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wzbd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/IMG_0336-scaled.jpg?fit=2560%2C1707&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21591"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21591\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21606,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21591\/revisions\/21606"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21600"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}