Staff photo by Travis Rosenau
Springfield’s Brooklyn Sturm handles the ball in the paint while guarded by Minnesota Valley Lutheran’s Avery Hopp (32) and Avery Freier (13) during a Tomahawk Conference girls basketball game at MVL High School on Friday night.
NEW ULM — Brooklyn Sturm finished a pair of assists shy of a triple-double on Friday night as the Springfield Tigers downed the Minnesota Valley Lutheran Chargers 63-42 in a Tomahawk Conference girls basketball game at MVL High School.
Sturm led the Tigers with 28 points, 12 rebounds, eight assists, four blocks and four steals. Despite the dominant showing, three other Tigers finished in double figures on the night, with Jasmine Novotny, Jada Reese and Emma Hauger each adding 10 points.
Hauger also had eight rebounds and three assists, while Novotny had seven boards and Marissa Pabst had six rebounds and five assists.
“What was nice, we had a lot of assists tonight, so that was a good part,” Springfield head coach Mike Kelly said. “We were passing the ball pretty well there after you have a little chat with them and say, ‘Hey, if you move the ball around a little bit, people are going to get open.’ So, I thought we passed the ball pretty well tonight. And we didn’t have that many turnovers, we’ve been having 25 turnovers a game, and I think we had around 15 or so.”
The Chargers were led by Olivia Hammer’s 11 points, three blocks and three steals, while Avery Hopp had 9 points and 11 rebounds, Marley Schauer had 8 points and six rebounds, Mackenzie Merseth had 5 points and 12 rebounds and Kerigan Brau added 6 points.
MVL head coach Hailey Santos credited Springfield for its ability to run its offense effectively in the win.
“I applaud Springfield for their ability to run the floor and to see the floor,” MVL head coach Hailey Santos said. “There’s a really strong connection between Sturm and Pabst running the floor. It’s hard because it’s not consistent and they sneak out on you and we talked about it and the girls were well-aware of it, but in the moment of the game, just mental lapses, we weren’t able to get back and find matchups so quickly and Springfield was able to take advantage of it.”
The Tigers stormed out to a 20-point lead, 24-4, after Pabst found Reese inside for a bucket on a fast break. After a free throw by Hopp, Hauger knocked down a jumper and Pabst scored inside to give the Tigers a 28-5 advantage.
The Chargers came to life with a 9-0 run, however, to trail 28-14 and force a Tigers timeout with 5:31 left in the half. During the run, the Chargers got a corner jumper and bucket inside by Brau, a long 3 by Hammer and a basket in the paint by Schauer.
The teams traded buckets after that and the Tigers took a 35-19 lead into the break.
After a Reese bucket inside and a baseline-driving layup by Sturm to start the second half, MVL got back on the board with a free throw from Avery Freier. But Sturm knocked down a 3 and a pair of free throws to give the Tigers a 44-20 lead.
The Chargers managed to cut their deficit to 16 again, 54-38, on a turnaround bucket in the paint by Hammer, but the Tigers grew their lead to as much as 25, 63-38, after Sturm scored on the low block in the final three minutes of play.
Hammer and Merseth scored late to make the final score.
The Tigers weren’t necessarily stagnant in the second half, but things did let up a little bit as the Chargers didn’t let things get too out of hand.
“I think we got real impatient on offense,” Kelly said in the second half. “I think we wanted to get off quick shots instead of moving the ball around and working it around a little bit and making them play a little bit more defense. And they were killing us on offensive boards, they got a lot of putbacks. Then we got foul happy a little bit and we couldn’t get out and transition because were were either fouling or giving them offensive rebounds, where at the beginning of the game, we got a lot of transition stuff to start the game.”
Santos said she was happy with her team’s ability to keep the game from unraveling in the second half, especially after a long week of games.
“Our big emphasis has been composure and just handling adversity in better ways,” Santos said. “We couldn’t quite chip away at the lead, but the fact that we were able to kind of maintain it and not lose progress is a good step in the right direction for us. Just not a lot of gas left in the tank after four games in the week, but the effort was there and that’s all you can ask for as a coach. So I’m really proud of the way they fought through today and the way they fought through the rest of the week.”
MVL (1-6, 0-2) hosts Gibbon-Fairfax-Winthrop in conference action on Tuesday night, while Springfield (3-3, 1-0) hosts Wabasso for a conference game Tuesday night.
