lady eagles down catholic

By: Lee Ramsey
The Seymour Lady Eagles defeated Catholic Lady Irish 42-33 at Catholic this past Friday night.  The Lady Eagles were led by senior point guard Casie Cowan with 14 points as well as good court leadership.  Shae Brown followed with 10 points and Ashley McCarter added 9.  The win keeps Seymour undefeated on the season but a tough game with Heritage is next.
After soundly defeating William Blount, Seymour didn’t seem to be hitting on all cylinders against the Lady Irish.  Shooting wasn’t sharp and defense was even less impressive.  Coach Rines wasn’t pleased with the way the girls played even though they did win.  He felt this veteran group should have done much better against a young inexperienced Catholic team. “Catholic is very young.  We didn’t play up to our potential.  We didn’t shoot well and didn’t defend well,” said Rines.
The Lady Eagles had a few runs but didn’t sustain a consistent offense.  They had chances but couldn’t pull away.  Both teams had more than their share of turnovers that were unforced.
The Lady Eagles created turnovers off the press the first half but started giving up easy shots in the second half after the Lady Irish adjusted to the 2-2-1 zone press. The half time score was 20-18 Seymour.
Coach Rines said, “We were very fortunate to win considering we didn’t play well.  We will play very good teams this season and we will have to play much better than we did in the Catholic game to win.”
Next up for the Lady Eagles is Heritage.  Coach Rines commented, “Heritage is a very good basketball team. They will be a big challenge.”
The boys’ team didn’t fair quite as well.  The Eagles only trailed at half time 22-18 to the ranked Irish but let the game slip away and lost 61-40.  The Eagles were solid defensively the first half but lost some intensity as the game unfolded.
Seymour was led in scoring by Tyler Tilson with 15, Skyler Brown with 10 and Garrett Hillard with 5 points.  Hilliard was injured during the game with a flying elbow to the head which required 5 stitches after being rushed to the hospital.
Seymour has played three ranked teams this season while installing a new system.  The players have to learn under fire.  With their difficult schedule, there is no time to rehearse. 
Coach Jessie had this to say, “We’ve known all season we had work to do.  We still do.  The boys will improve.  We’re going to be alright.  They don’t have any quit in them. We can’t have breakdowns.  We’ve got to focus every possession. Nobody will remember what we did in December.  They will, however, remember what we do in February when it comes tournament time.”
After asking Coach Jessie to summarize the Catholic game, his response was “We need to learn to be more consistent.  A team like Catholic will beat you every time if you aren’t.  We’ve got to be consistent all four quarters.”  The coach added, “We will get better.  They won’t quit. Catholic was a big, strong, talented team.”
The Eagles play Heritage next.  They will play a Thanksgiving tournament, the Kroger Classic, at Gibbs High School on November 24, 27 and 28th.