December 20th, 2011
The Elyria Catholic Boys Varsity basketball team welcomed WSC foe North Ridgeville to the Coliseum on Tuesday night, and extended their winning streak to 6 as they surpassed the Rangers 44-33.
Victory however wasn't easy for EC, even when facing a winless Ranger basketball team. With a rough first half and counting more on free throws, EC still treated North Ridgeville like they would any other opponent.
"I give the Rangers a lot of credit," Coach Kuchta complimented, "They haven't won a game, and they played hard. We knew it was going to be that way." Elyria Catholic only made 2 of 13 shots in the first half, and had trouble getting the ball inside the paint to Jeremy Holley.
"We couldn't get it in to Jeremy (Holley), he had no time to get hot, and we couldn't get any shots down." Junior Danny Whitacre stated. Junior point guard Cory Strasko went into halftime the scoring leader with 8 points.
The second half however was a bigger leap for the struggling EC offense, and Whitacre stepped up his game, scoring eight points and grabbing four rebounds in the second half to get a bigger lead over North Ridgeville.
"Every single game we talk about out rebounding the opponent." Says Whitacre, "I guess today I just focused more on that then anything." Whitacre led the team in points overall with 10 on Tuesday.
"We knew we had a mismatch down low, and we tried to get (Whitacre) the ball along with Jeremy (Holley)." Coach Kuchta said, "(Whitacre) did a nice job, it was definitely timely scoring." Jeremy Holley also dominated the boards for EC, grabbing twelve overall.
Elyria Catholic's next game is Friday against the Amherst Comets. "The Amherst game is going to be the exact same way (as tonight's)." Says Coach Kuchta, "They hold the ball a lot, so we will just have to find a way to get passed (Amherst) like we did this one." Meanwhile Danny Whitacre wants to come out on Friday with a bang.
"We have to come out and have a better approach because we just didn't come out the way we should've tonight. It's plain and simple."
EC vs. Amherst. 7:30pm at Amherst Steele High School. Be There.
Stats:
Cory Strasko - 10 PTS, 5 RBS, 1 AST
Andrew Konno - 2 PTS
MJ Lotko - 4 PTS, 2 RBS
Daniel Whitacre - 10 PTS, 5 RBS, 1 BLK,
Tyler Riddell - 5 PTS, 1 RBS,
Joe Dempsey - 2 PTS, 3 RBS
John Stursa - 4 RBS, 1 AST
Xavier Bennett - 2 PTS, 5 RBS
Matt Morgan - 1 RB
EC was 12-16 (75%) from the free throw line.
The Panthers had 15 turnovers and was 15-56 from the field.
The EC JV Boys beat North Ridgeville 41-25. Freshman D.J. Graham led the JV Boys with 15 points, followed by Conner Riddell with 12, and Ceevan Shelton with 6.
Official Elyria Catholic Sports Reporter
Jake Hromada '14
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