Pirates battle, fall in opener to L-B

PERKINS TWP. — Perkins was right there throughout the first three quarters against Liberty-Benton, a team that went 21-3 last season and features a Division I-bound senior. The Pirates led after one and were tied at each of the next two intervals. But the fourth quarter was all Eagles. "We want to play together, we want to lean on each other," Perkins coach Ryan Orshoski said. "I thought that showed tonight, even through our mistakes. We've got to play together if we're gonna compete with this schedule." Perkins eventually fell to L-B, 51-34, on the opening night of the Ohio high school girls basketball season. The visitors scored 23 of the 29 points in the final frame on Wednesday. "Our girls battled," Orshoski said. "I'm as proud as I can be about this group. Pound for pound, inch for inch, battling with a team with that size showed a lot of heart, moxie and togetherness today." BGSU-signee Lauren Gerken had 30 points, 13 rebounds, three blocks and two assists for Liberty-Benton. "When Gerken started hitting some shots, we had to get outside of our gameplan, and they made us pay for that," Orshoski said. The Pirates' strategy worked how they hoped through three quarters. No catch for the 6-foot-1 Gerken was easy, and when she did get the ball inside, another defender was quick to double. "We were really, really swarming Gerken," Orshoski said. On the offensive end, Perkins was deliberate but successful against an L-B team playing a couple different varieties of zone. Camryn VanVlerah was effective at the high post, scoring 11 of her 13 points in the first half. She caught and drove on a couple of occasions, then hit one jumper from the foul line, too. Haylie Brunner made life difficult on L-B's offensive initiators, hounding them full court. She also dropped in a tough floater and a 3-pointer, with the top of the key make pushing Perkins' lead to 16-11 in the second quarter. "Haylie attacked their point guard defensively and caused a lot of havoc there, which kept them off balance," Orshoski said. "I was really proud of the girls to hit timely shots and get to the foul line and keep us right there." Perkins went up 18-11 on a VanVlerah bucket, but L-B closed the half on a 10-3 run. The Eagles scored the first five points of the third, but Perkins surged 7-2 to make it 28-28 heading to the fourth quarter. "(Orshoski) does a great job," L-B coach Chad Lieb said. "... They were extremely physical with us." Gerken started the final stanza with a putback, and L-B never trailed again. Lindsay May's steal and layup added a frenetic pace to the proceedings, and when Gerken drilled a trio of triples, it was too big a deficit for Perkins to recover from. "Gerken took over," Orshoski said. "If we have to lose with her hitting stepback 3s, we will. She was unconscious." The positive for Perkins is that it has been here before. The Pirates played a brutal non-league slate last winter and spent much of the season with a sub-.500 record. They used those experiences to make it all the way to the district final. And now, they've got all those lessons learned in the back of their minds. For three quarters, they played right with a talented Liberty-Benton squad, and the hope is that when the games get bigger, the Pirates will know how to finish again, too. "That was the benefit of playing a tough schedule (last year), the girls were not shocked by a lot of environments," Orshoski said. LIBERTY-BENTON (1-0) Lindsay May 5 0-0 10, Lauren Gerken 10 5-6 30, Addi Crow 1 0-0 2, Corra Dehart 4 1-4 9. TOTALS 20 6-10 51 PERKINS (0-1) Ellie Manion 1 0-0 3, Maggie Farley 0 1-2 1, Haylie Brunner 2 0-0 5, Camryn VanVlerah 4 5-8 13, Avery Baker 1 0-0 2, Kendall Zeiher 3 2-3 10. TOTALS 11 8-13 34 Perkins 11 10 7 6 — 34L-B 7 14 7 23 — 51 3-point goals — Liberty-Benton 5 (Gerken 5); Perkins 4 (Zeiher 2, Manion 1, Brunner 1)