It was just a case of too much size when the Princeton Vikings took a 69-51 win over Olmsted Falls last Saturday.
With that win, the Vikings won the Ohio High School Athletic Association Division I girls championship.
Of the 69 points, 44 came inside, including 20 points coming on second chances.
“Those two big girls were really good,” point guard Paige Kohler said.”Both could rebound the ball and finish around the rim really well. When you have two girls like that, that makes it tough. We have one big girl, but they had two at the same time.
Diawna Carter-Hartley finished with 18 points, while Kali Fortson had 16.
The Vikings (28-2) used that height and size to run off 11 consecutive points to open the second quarter, turning a 1-point advantage into a 28-16 lead. From that point on, the Bulldogs struggled to catch up.
“We knew that coming into but just honestly,” Olmsted Falls Coach Jordan Eaton said. “A lot of those points were from offensive rebounds.
“We had to rebound a little bit better. That's the biggest thing and I didn't prepare them for the rebounding physicality that that Princeton had tonight. You got to give them a lot of credit. They just were relentless on the backwards and they out fought us.”
Due to that difference, the Bulldogs (22-4) were forced into shooting more than normal 3-point shots, hitting just 9 of 34 from long distance. Danielle Cameron was the only successful 3-point shooter, hitting 6 of 9 in scoring 22 points. But those statistics might be off due to having to shoot more long-distance shots because of the difference in the score late in the game, said their coach.
“That's our game,” Eaton said. “Probably a couple of late that we had to take just because I think we needed a quick shot or we needed something.But we really do try to take what's given and we did get a lot of open looks.”
Olmsted Falls, in fact, had trouble shooting, connecting on just 18 of 57 shots.
That size advantage also showed in rebounds, with Princeton grabbing 40 compared to Olmsted Falls’ 29.
That advantage allowed the Vikings to run. They ended up with 20 fast-break points.
The Bulldogs did not go away easily. They cut the Princeton lead to 40-35 with3:38 left in the third quarter, but an 8-4 Viking run upped that advantage to 10 points going into the final quarter.
Princeton closed out the game by outscoring Olmsted Falls 13-4 in the final four minutes.
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