Longhorns lock down on Osborn
DALTON VITT/DAILY FORUM
South Nodaway sophomore forward Alex Buckles spins in the post against Osborn as the Longhorns came away with a 59-38 win on Friday in Barnard.
The South Nodaway girls’ basketball team showed off its lock-down defensive skills Friday night, harassing and discombobulating Osborn en route to a 59-38 win in Barnard.
Osborn mustered only two points in the first quarter, allowing the Longhorns to leap out to a sizable lead. In the fourth period, the Wildcats came up with just six points in the first five minutes, allowing South Nodaway to ride its stout defense to a double-digit victory.
“The girls really started with a lot of energy at the beginning and the girls that came off the bench kept that the standard,” Longhorns head coach Aaron Murphy said. “The energy level was big tonight with the home crowd. … It was good to see that. We did some good things.”
South Nodaway tallied the first 13 points of the night with senior forward Erin Salsbury scoring the first four. Junior guard Mallory McConkey found the bottom of the net on a three-point attempt from the right wing to boost the lead to 9-0 in the midst of the run.
Meanwhile, on the defensive end, the Longhorns forced the Wildcats to hoist difficult perimeter shots and blanked Osborn up until there were 56 seconds left in the first frame. The standout defense allowed South Nodaway to hold a 16-2 lead at the end of one.
“Seeing some other girls get those steals in those situations tells me that we’re growing a little bit,” Murphy said of his team’s defensive effort. “We’re starting to understand what we’re trying to do. Getting more girls in there, getting that experience is just going to help us later down the road.”
Another strong start, this time to the second period, extended the South Nodaway lead even further. The Longhorns came up with the first nine points of the period, keyed by their usual fast break onslaught.
Osborn knocked down its first shot of the quarter at the 4:43 mark on a three-pointer from freshman Haily Davis on the left wing. The Horns took a 32-11 lead into the break.
The Wildcats finally came up with a counterpunch in the third quarter, using a 7-0 run to slice the deficit to 35-18. South Nodaway junior guard Meaghan McConkey buried a pair of free throws with 3:31 left in the frame to halt the streak.
The Longhorns had an answer of their own, completing a six-point run that rebuilt the lead to 47-24 and allowed them to carry an insurmountable 47-26 advantage into the final quarter.
“It’s all about responding,” Murphy said. “When a team goes on a little run and you don’t respond, you’re probably under. Our girls responded. They rose to the occasion. Whenever Osborn had a little run, we were able to get some baskets to fall our way on the other end.”
Early in the fourth period, South Nodaway put together a short 5-0 spurt to put the game away for good, highlighted by an and-one from Meaghan McConkey.
Meaghan McConkey led the way with 24 points, followed by Salsbury with 12 and Mallory McConkey with nine.
The Longhorns (9-2) will play in next week’s Stanberry Invitational as the tournament’s third seed, taking on sixth-seeded King City at 7:30 p.m. on Tuesday, Jan. 12. Friday’s win over Osborn came on the heels of an eight-point loss Monday, Jan. 4 at Stanberry to start the post-break portion of the Longhorns’ schedule.
“We responded,” Murphy said. “Stanberry’s a good team. We knew that going in. They were the better team that night. We moved on to Osborn. The only thing we could do is respond, and we did.”
DALTON VITT/DAILY FORUM
Longhorns junior guard Mallory McConkey goes up over Osborn defenders on Friday during her team’s victory at home, 59-38.
DALTON VITT/DAILY FORUM
Junior guard Meaghan McConkey spins down low before putting up a shot for South Nodaway as the Longhorns captured a 59-38 win over Osborn on Friday.
