Experience key in Indian win over Winfield

DAILY MAIL SPORTSWRITER

WINFIELD - Just call them the young and the experienced.

Sissonville's girls basketball team has a roster full of playerswith state tournament experience in one or more sports who alsohappen to be underclassmen. Tuesday night the advantages anddisadvantages of that combination showed as the talented Indiansfought off the likewise young and talented but smaller and much lessseasoned Winfield for a 60-50 road win in front of 300 fans.

Sophomores Emily Facemyer, Christina Kessell, and Andrea Lewisled the way with 16, 10 and 10 points respectively. Junior MaryFowler added 12.

All four started or played lots of minutes for last season'sstate finalist team, experience that has proven valuable.

"You learned how to get focused," Facemyer said. She was also thegoalie for the soccer squad that made the state finals this pastfall. "I don't even realize if there's pressure."

Lewis, the point guard, not only started last season but alsopitched the Indians to the state softball title last spring.

"This year I feel more comfortable," she said. "I'm not reallynervous."

The lone senior on the squad, Krissy Cavender, completes thestarting five and also started last season.

Sissonville (5-3) came out with an intensity that the Generals (7-1) were able to match in only two of the first three quarters andnot exceed until the fourth quarter when they made a run to get backinto contention after trailing by as many as 20 with 3:34 left inthe third period.

"We played hard," Indian Coach Annette Olenchick said. "Thefourth quarter we kind of lost our composure."

Winfield took its last lead of the game 18 seconds into thesecond period when a Karah Cloxton 3-pointer gave the Generals a 16-15 advantage.

Sissonville answered with an 11-1 run using its height advantageto pound the ball inside and either hit easy buckets or draw a foul.

Facemyer, Fowler, and Kessell are 5-foot-10, 5-10, and 6-0respectively while the Generals front line stood at 6-0, 5-8, and 5-7 at its tallest.

With the Generals leading scorer, Kristin Crede, forced to thebench with foul difficulties Winfield could score only six morepoints in the quarter.

The Indians ended up hitting 10-of-18 shots from the floor and 13-of-16 from the free throw line as they took a 12-point lead into thebreak.

The more outside-oriented Generals could sink only 7-of-24 shotsin the first half and were out-rebounded 18-8.

"We were nervous tonight," Winfield Coach Paul Sutherland said."They played smart."

In the second half, Winfield often went to a five-guard setupwith the tallest player 5-8 Stephanie Murnahan and actually pulleddown 13 rebounds to Sissonville's 12 and cut the lead to as littleas eight

The Indians ended up making 19-of-36 field goal attempts, 53percent. The Generals actually shot better from 3-point range, wherethey hit 8-of-19, 42 percent, than from 2-point range where they hitonly 8-of-35, 23 percent. Overall Winfield finished at 30 percent.

Sissonville's Cavender made her team's only 3-point attempt.

"We're starting to click more," Facemyer said. "We're just nowreally getting started."

Last year Sissonville stood at 5-4 at one time before reeling off15 wins in its last 17 games.

"We're looking for improvement every game, every practice,"Olenchick said. "We played better defense tonight."

Tiffany Martin led the Generals with 13 points, StephanieMurnahan added 11, and Cloxton 10.

Facemyer led all rebounders with eight and Martin had seven tolead Winfield.