Troy Christian used 13 points from Lauren Lavy and 12 from Hailey Peters to capture their fifth victory of the season last week, defeating Yellow Springs 51-31 to run their record to 5-3 overall. The Eagles are now off until January 4 and will enjoy a nice Christmas break.

The Eagles started fast in the game, jumping out to a 10-0 lead in the opening quarter. Troy Christian then fell apart in the second quarter and watched as the Bulldogs took an 18-14 lead at the half.

“We got the ball inside and scored early in the game, but then we started missing a lot of easy shots,” Troy Christian coach Dick Steineman said. “We lost our focus and concentration in the second quarter, and they hit a couple of three’s and got back into the game.”

“We wanted to refocus at halftime and come back out and do what we were supposed to do.”

Another obstacle standing in the way for the Eagles was high-scoring Liz Smith, averaging over 20 points per game for the Bulldogs.

“We started out in a box-and-one on Liz and scrapped that at halftime,” Steineman said. “We then went man-to-man with Meredith Hadded on her, and denying her the ball. The kids stepped up and played great defense, and on offense we started working the ball around and started to score in the paint.”

Haddad held Smith to eight points while she was on her, and according to Steineman, she is a game changer.

“Meredith is a relentless worker and we challenged her,” the coach said. “I told her if we can hold her to under 17, we can win. She had three at half, and Meredith stepped up to the challenge and is starting to get into basketball shape.”

In the second half, Troy Christian outscored Yellow Springs 37-13 enroute to the win. It was a team effort that led the Eagles to a big 16 minutes.

“We had three girls in double figures in rebounds, and Kinley Blake was huge off the bench in the second half. On the boards, we got after them in the second half. We had a size advantage on them and the posts delivered in the second half.”

Lavy added 10 rebounds to her point total, while Peters grabbed 13 boards. Also scoring for Troy Christian was Kathryn Lee with eight points and 12 rebounds, Haddad six points, five rebounds, five assists, Blake eight points.

Troy Christian is now 5-3 and turning their focus on the new year ahead.

“That was a big win, and each win builds confidence and we want to continue this winning tradition.”

The Eagles return to the court January 4 against Xenia Christian at home.