The Sacred Heart Knights girls lost 56-51 to Russell Tuesday night, but the Knight boys prevailed in the nightcap over the Broncos 60 to 54.
GIRLS
After falling behind by 13 in the first half, the Sacred Heart girls stormed back to take the lead midway through the fourth quarter, but would up losing to Russell by 5.
The Lady Broncos pushed their record to 11 and 4 and a league leading 8-1 in the NCAA conference despite getting a rare off night from their senior point guard Tiffany Dortland. Dortland did lead Russell in scoring with 13, but that output was nearly 8 points under her season average. Juniors Megan Peeler and Janae Schulte helped pick up the slack scoring 11 and 9 points respectively—the combined 20 points nearly double their collective season average. Freshman Rylan Reeves chipped in with 8 points all in the first half.
The leading scorer in the game was Sacred Heart’s Ally Cochran, a junior, who tallied 16. Sophomore Hannah Goetz lit it up from behind the arc with 12 points all coming on treys.
Head Coach Arnold Schmidtberger was pleased with his team’s effort and the fact that they battled back from a double digit deficit to take the lead, but he said a stretch of about 60 seconds of clock time at the halfway point of the 4th quarter where the Knights were guilty of both some physical and mental errors is what made the difference.
The Lady Knights are now 9 and 7 overall and 5-4 in NCAA league play.
BOYS
Sacred Heart junior Tate Herrenbruck accounted for over half of his team’s 60 points as the Knight boys took down the Broncos by 6.
At one point in the first half Herrenbruck knocked down 16 consecutive points for Sacred Heart and finished the game with 32. No other Knight had double digit scoring.
Despite Herrenbruck’s heroics, Russell managed to make a game of it. After trailing big in the first half, the Broncos crawled to within 3 late in the game, but never had the ball with a chance to tie the game. Russell was led in scoring by seniors Tyler Whipple who had 21 and Austin Price with 10.
Knight Head Coach Brian Gormley said following the game that Herrenbruck’s ability to score from anywhere on the floor is the key to his success.
Sacred Heart improved to 12 and 4 overall and 8 and 1 in the NCAA which is still a game back of league leading Beloit who remained undefeated in conference play with a 5 point win at SE of Saline. Russell is now 7 and 9 overall and 4-6 in the NCAA.
