Bellevue girls clinch SBC Lake title outright

SANDUSKY — Bellevue wasted little time. The Lady Red had two 3-pointers in the first 17 seconds of the game. It was a sign of big things to come for Div. IV No. 2 Bellevue. The Lady Red hit 10 triples in the first quarter and 13 for the game, clinching the outright Sandusky Bay Conference Lake Division title with a 89-16 win over Sandusky on Thursday. "We have the capability of doing that," Bellevue coach Kory Santoro said. "It's been tough sometimes because after going through stats today, in 20 of our 21 games, we've had double-digit wins. That's a testament to our players. Some of these games, they're only playing half of it. "Tonight, we let them go and told them to play their game. We're on a 10-game schedule now. We're going to start dialing in now." Bellevue improved to 21-0 overall and 9-0 in league play. Just one game separates the Lady Red from an undefeated regular season. That final game is Saturday when Bellevue travels down Route 20 to take on Clyde. Of all the things Bellevue has done in school history, including the 12 seasons Santoro has been coach and a state championship last season, it has never had an undefeated regular season. "All we said is we want to win every game we play," Santoro said. "We focus on one game at a time. We wanted to win our league and make another run at a state title. We feel like we have the talent to do it. Along the way, that stuff will happen. We have one more league game to go. We'll be ready Saturday." The league championship is the Lady Red's 16th in a row. The streak began with Ryan Orshoski coaching Bellevue to four straight titles before Santoro took over before the 2014-2015 season. "It's crazy," Santoro said. "I feel blessed to coach at Bellevue with the girls we get to coach. They continue to work hard every year and it's an amazing feeling to have those type of girls behind you." Bellevue took away any dramatics from the title-clinching victory quickly. Mazie Gracemyer and CJ Savage opened the game with triples. After a Sandusky timeout, the Lady Red forced a turnover and that led to Ellie Freitag canning a 3. The Blue Streaks (3-18, 1-9) struggled to take care of the ball against the suffocating Bellevue press and defense. Ava Jakubcin-Theis hit a triple before two more from Savage made it 18-1. Kaitlyn Turinsky scored on an offensive rebound and a pair of 3-pointers from Savage ballooned the lead to 27-1. Bellevue finished the quarter 10 of 16 from 3 including five makes from Savage. The lethal sharpshooter ended the night by tying both her career-high in points with 25 and made 3s with seven. Both are season-highs for the junior. "She has one of the nicest strokes I've seen in girls basketball," Santoro said. "She's lanky and long. When she gets the ball, she shoots it quick and when she's dialed in, it's going to be a nightmare for teams." Savage made the first nine shots she attempted, including all seven 3-pointers. She said it took just a couple shots to realize she was in for a big night. "We didn't have practice yesterday, so we knew we had to come in hot," Savage said. "We wanted to play our game and do what we do best. "I was shooting it well." Freitag added a four-point play later in the quarter before a score from Turinsky gave Bellevue a 38-3 lead after eight minutes. Sandusky had 10 turnovers in the first quarter and made just 1 of 12 shots. "It doesn't feel possible to beat them when they shoot like that," Streaks coach John Winborn said. "When you give up 30 points just from the 3-point line in a quarter or a half, a team is tough to beat. Kory has a great program. They're very fundamentally sound and they're very disciplined." The loss was uncomfortable, but Sandusky will take a bigger concern from the game. Maekhiya Rameau, who scored all three of the Streaks' points in the first quarter, rolled her ankle late in the quarter. She limped to the sideline and never returned. Sandusky is off until next Thursday when it faces Ashland in a Div. III tournament opener. Winborn said the message to his team is pretty simple. "Keep fighting. That's all you can do," he said. "That's just like in life. When you go up against a tough opponent, are you going to quit or are you going to fight? We have no choice but to fight. That's our motto." Bellevue forced nine more turnovers in the second quarter and buckets from Freitag and Savage pushed the lead to 64-5 at halftime. The game was the Lady Red's third in four days after defeating Oregon Clay on Monday and Shelby on Tuesday. In total, Bellevue will have five games over the final nine days of the regular season. "Our famous saying is nobody cares, work harder," Santoro said. "We knew we had four games this week, but nobody cares. We still have to play. We gave them a day off to recoup and I think that day off paid off." BELLEVUE (21-0, 9-0) Ellie Freitag 5 1-1 13, Ava Jakubcin-Theis 3 1-2 8, CJ Savage 9 0-0 25, Kaitlyn Turinsky 8 3-4 19, Mazie Gracemyer 6 1-1 14, Ava Hirt 0 2-3 2, Bailey Nichols 3 0-0 8. TOTALS 34 8-11 89 SANDUSKY (3-18, 1-9) Juli'onna Raymore 0 0-0 0, Amari Prentice 1 0-0 2, Shauntha Wilson 1 0-0 2, Maekhiya Rameau 1 1-4 3, Brooklyn Daniels 0 0-0 0, Cassidy Stovall 3 0-0 6, Crysten Johnson 1 1-1 3. TOTALS 7 2-5 16 Bellevue 38 26 21 4 — 89 Sandusky 3 2 4 7 — 16 Three-point goals: Bellevue 13 (Savage 7, Freitag 2, Nichols 2, Jakubcin-Theis, Gracemyer); Sandusky 0