Photos by Steven Wright | Greene County News
Beavercreek senior Charlotte Pauling (5) skies over the Troy defense to score her team’s first two points of the game. Beavercreek went on to win 59-16 and advance in Division I sectional play.
Beavercreek senior Mia Patterson (3) loses possession on a drive to the basket. She led Beavercreek in scoring with 11 points.
Beavercreek senior Lilli Leopard (10) was aggressive throughout the first half, taking every opportunity available to drive to the basket with the ball.
Lana Srbinovski added to the Beavercreek scoreboard for the third time during her sophomore season.
Beavercreek freshman Lucy Zollars (34) had five points in the fourth quarter of Wednesday’s win.
Beavercreek sophomore Mallory Fields (24) tries to work her way around defenders for a putback attempt after grabbing an offensive rebound.
VANDALIA — Beavercreek used lockdown defense to overwhelm Troy 59-16 in its Division I sectional tournament opening game on Wednesday at Butler High School.
Beavercreek, the No. 2-seed in the Southwest District’s North region, held Troy scoreless for most of the first half. After allowing the game’s first two points, Beavercreek went on a 10-0 run that spanned most of the remainder of the quarter.
Up 18-7 later in the second, another 15-0 run closed out the half and as the Beavers rarely allowed an open shot attempt and ran the floor in transition for easy layups.
“We’re trying to improve on a couple of things,” head coach Aric Seilhamer said. “Need to be better about keeping the ball out of the paint and boxing out when rebounding, and that’s been our priority on the kids the last week or so.”
Beavercreek (17-6) worked on those fundamentals to great success against the 17th-seeded Trojans. The run from the end of the first half extended just under another five minutes into the third quarter as the Beavers built a 40-10 lead.
A basket by Lana Srbinovski sent the game into a running clock situation as the fourth quarter got underway. Beavercreek’s starters spent most of the final eight minutes cheering on their teammates from the bench as all 10 players that suited up got on the scoreboard by the final buzzer.
“We tell the kids when you share the ball and move the ball, basketball is a lot easier and it was a great what they did,” Seilhamer said.
Mia Patterson had 11 points and Charlotte Pauling scored 10 as the only players to reach double figures.
Beavercreek advances to play No. 11 Wayne in the sectional final at 7:30 p.m. on Feb. 21 back at Butler HS.
The Beavers won both regular season meetings against the Warriors, but were challenged both times. Beavercreek won the first meeting by one and needed a buzzer beating shot to avoid overtime in the rematch.
“It was nice to get this win and now we get a week,” Seilhamer said. “We’ve played Wayne twice and know that they’re hungry to get us the third time we play.”
Contact Steven Wright at 937-502-4498 and follow on X (formerly Twitter) @Steven_Wright_.
