JAMESTOWN — The first time it happened, Greeneview fans could’ve just chocked it up to a nifty play from Cedarville’s floor leader, Elly Coe, to Indians teammate Anessa Butts for a nifty score right before the halftime buzzer.
Then it happened again.
With the final seconds in the quarter ticking down, Coe was able to drive close to the basket, then dish the ball off to Butts who was wide open for the score … twice. And Butts hit them both, in an eventual 42-34 Cedarville road win, Thursday Feb. 6 at Greeneview High.
“I’m giving props to Anessa Butts tonight. She’s all of 5-foot-1. She’s someone that does everything you say, and she gets yelled at just as much as, if not more than, everybody else,” Cedarville coach Josh Mason said of Butts. “She does whatever I ask of her, and then for her to come out and play a great game against Greeneview for us this year — I know this game didn’t have conference implications like the boys game tomorrow — Anessa stepped up and made some big buckets for us, and she deserves that.”
Butts and teammate Luisa Christian both finished with eight points, sophomore forward Ciara Horney scored 10 points, and Coe led the Indians with 15 points and at least three nifty assists.
Both schools’ boys basketball teams will return to Greeneview High on Friday night, Feb. 7 for a 7:30 p.m. game between the Ohio Heritage Conference’s South division co-leaders.
Greeneview’s Sylvie Sonneman entered the contest as the Ohio Heritage Conference’s leading scorer, and so Cedarville paid her plenty of attention … and she still finished with a game-high 17 points. Faith Rutherford also scored in double figures for the Rams, finishing with 10 points.
Mason said his team may have been motivated by some quotes he read to his team by the late Los Angeles Lakers great, Kobe Bryant.
“Last week with the death of Kobe, we kind of went over some of his work habits and his quotes,” Mason said. “And one of the quotes was: ‘Something you can control in your life is people remember you, or they don’t. You’re in control of that.’
”So we told ourselves that our theme for the rest of the year was going to be that no one’s going to remember our record or any of that, but the people who watch you play, are they gonna remember you, or not? Our goal for the rest of the year is to make it so that people will remember playing us.”
It’s Cedarville’s second win over the Rams (10-11, 7-8 OHC South) this season. The Indians (10-11, 6-9 OHC South) claimed a closer 48-45 win in Cedarville back on Dec. 12, 2019. The win snaps a four-game Indians losing streak, while halting a two-game Greeneview winning run.
Rams coach Tim Hoelle gave a 23-second comment after the game, and was visibly frustrated with his team’s play.
“Cedarville played a great game. They played better than we did. They made plays when plays needed to be made, and our kids didn’t make plays when they needed to be made. But we’ll just try to learn from everything. We’ve gotta get back to practice, and then play Southeastern on Saturday,” Hoelle said. “We don’t have much time to get over this, but we’ve gotta get over it quick, and hopefully finish on a strong note on Saturday.”
The Rams’ home game is set for 12:30 p.m. on Feb. 8. Cedarville hits the road that same day and time for a game at London Madison-Plains.
