Addison Steinlage and her Turkey Valley girls basketball teammates don’t like losing, and falling on a late 3-point shot like the Trojans did to MFL MarMac earlier this month was doubly tough.
But the Trojans turned that heartbreaking defeat into a positive last week as they rolled to two Upper Iowa Conference wins — picking up a 44-34 road win at Central Elkader Tuesday and then played an almost flawless second half to beat North Fayette Valley 65-36 at home on Friday.
“It kind of reset us … that not everything is automatic so we’ve got to remember that we have to work for things,” Steinlage said Friday night after she scored 15 points, made five steals and dished out four assists in the win over the TigerHawks. “So we went into practice with a new mindset that we have to reset and work even harder.”
The two wins kept the Trojans’ dream of winning an Upper Iowa Conference title intact as they ended last week with an 11-2 record to trail MFL by just one-half game in the standings.
“First off, we don’t back down from anybody,” Turkey Valley coach Steve Hoffert said. “Whoever it is, we’re going to go toe-to-toe with them. They’ve faced a lot of adversity. They just keep fighting. They’re not going to give up.”
And that is how Friday night’s home game played out.
It wasn’t like Turkey Valley played a poor first half against North Fayette Valley; after all, the Trojans led 29-21 at the break.
But that was just a warm-up before Turkey Valley put together one of its best halves of the season to run away from a TigerHawk team that came into the game with a 10-6 record.
With Layni Schuchhardt hitting a 3-pointer, Bella Stika scoring on an offensive rebound and Schuchhardt draining two free throws, the Trojans scored the first seven points of the third quarter and then ended the frame with steals from Steinlage and Stika that led to buckets, a Stika put back and a Steinlage layup off an assist from Stika.
Up 44-30, Turkey Valley opened the fourth quarter with a 14-2 run that was sparked by three 3-pointers from Annika Bodensteiner and cruised to the win.
As good as the offense was, it was the defense that set the tone against North Fayette Valley.
“Sometimes when your shots aren’t going, the best thing we can do is ‘d-up,’” Steinlage said, “and we know we have a lot of girls who can come off the bench with a lot of energy.:
Hoffert agreed.
“We put a premium on defense in practice. We do our drills — pressuring the ball, helping on defense, switching on screens, talking on screens, picking crossovers,” he said. “You saw a lot of that tonight. It wasn’t perfect, but it was really good defense.”
The win over the TigerHawks came three nights after the Trojans survived a relatively slow start and used a 16-4 third quarter to pick up that 10-point win in Elkader.
Steinlage had 14 points on 7-for-10 shooting from the floor while Stika had a double-double with 10 points and 13 rebounds.
Against North Fayette Valley, Stika had another double-double, scoring 17 points and grabbing 17 rebounds while Steinlage finished with 15 points and Bodensteiner had 12.
Stika is averaging 10.4 points and 13.4 rebounds a game, and it is the second stat which her coach may appreciate the most.
“She’s got a nose for the ball,” Hoffert said. “That’s one of the things she’s good at. When I talked to the girls, I talk about working to your strengths. One of Bella’s strengths is her athleticism … she’s long, she can jump, she can get those arms up, and anything that’s close, she’s going to get.”
And now the Trojans are hoping for some help when it comes to chasing down a UIC title. MFL is 11-1 in league games, and its toughest test looks to be a game against Kee, which is 9-3 in conference play on Feb. 7.
With or without a conference championship, Hoffert is impressed with how far his team has come.
“They’re just a resilient bunch of kids, and they’ve gained a lot of maturity,” he said. “We’ve talked about it with them where last year, in a game like this, a team would make a run and we’d just crumble. But we’ve had that growth, and even from the beginning of the year to now has been a huge step.”
Turkey Valley 10 10 16 8 44
Central Elkader 13 8 4 9 34
Scoring – Addison Steinlage 14; Bella Stika 10; Ermersyn Hoffert 6; Ellaney Bodensteiner 6; Annika Bodensteiner 3; Hazel Nieman 3; Layni Schuchhardt 2
Rebounds – Stika 13; E. Bodensteiner 4; Delaney Busta 3; Nieman 3; Steinlage 1; A. Bodensteiner 1; Schuchhardt 1; Assists – Steinlage 2; Hoffert 2; E. Bodensteiner 2; A. Bodensteiner 1; Schuchhardt 1; Stika 1; Busta 1; Steals – Stika 5; Steinlage 2; A. Bodensteiner 1; Busta 1; Blocks – Hoffert 2; E. Bodensteiner 1
NFV 11 10 9 6 36
Turkey Valley 18 11 15 21 65
Scoring – Stika 17; Steinlage 15; A. Bodensteiner 12; Hoffert 6; Schuchhardt 5; Nieman 4; Busta 2; Miyah Byrne 2; E. Bodensteiner 2
Rebounds – Stika 17; E. Bodensteiner 4; Kendall Kuennen 3; Steinlage 2; Nieman 2; Ella Ives 2; A. Bodensteiner 1; Schuchhardt 1; Assists – Steinlage 4; A. Bodensteiner 3; Schuchhardt 2; Stika 2; Busta 1; Nieman 1; Hoffert 1; Brynlee Hayek 1; Steals – Steinlage 5; Stika 3; Nieman 2; A. Bodensteiner 1; Schuchhardt 1; Hoffert 1; Hayek 1; E. Bodensteiner 1; Blocks – A. Bodensteiner 2; Hoffert 2; Stika 1
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