PITSBURG – The Franklin Monroe girls basketball team beat St. Henry from the Midwest Athletic Conference 50-43 on Tuesday night.
The Lady Jets improved their record to 7-3 while staying at 3-2 in the Cross County Conference in this non-league affair. The Hangar saw the Jets hang in for a hard-fought, physical victory in front of 100 spectators who saw St. Henry drop to 5-5 overall.
The first quarter saw the Redskins race out to a 4-0 lead at the 5:08 mark. However, Belle Cable chimed in one of her two 3-pointers for the quarter to put the Jets on the scoreboard.
FM’s Corina Conley was whistled for her second foul of the quarter with 4:27 left, which caused the Jets to look for more scoring and rebounding options. The Lady Jets did refuel and outscored the MAC opponent by 2 to go up 12-10 after 8 minutes of action. The Cable girls led by Belle Cable with 10 and Audrey Cable with 2 did all the scoring for Coach Abbey Moore’s squad.
The second quarter action saw the Jets’ high octane offense exploding for 15 points while limiting the Kurt Huelsman-led Redskins to only 8. The last 4:27 of the quarter saw the Jets flying to the hoop by outscoring the MAC squad 10-3 to secure a 27-18 halftime lead.
Belle Cable led the Jets again in this canto with 6 points with two triples. Also hanging points on the scoreboard at the Hangar were Kinsey Goins, Conley, Kennedy Morris and Audrey Cable.
The third quarter scoring bursts were shown by both teams as St. Henry cut it down to 31-27 with 3:34 to go. The Jets turned their turbines to high octane offense and sped past the slower Redskins by scoring 7 of the last 10 points for a 38-30 advantage going into the all-important fourth.
Conley exploded in this third frame by canning in two jumpers and nailing 3-of-4 from the charity stripe. Belle Cable and Audrey Cable scored 2 points apiece to give Coach Moore some breathing room going into the final eight minutes.
The fourth and frantic final quarter saw the Redskins red hot and got the score down to 1 point, 39-38, with 3:45 to go for an 8-1 run outburst.
However, the charity stripe again propelled the Jets to another victory as they made 10 of their 12 points from the line for an 83 percent clip. They finished up on a run of 11-5 to send the Redskins on the path to Mercer County with a defeat in hand.
Leading the fourth quarter fireworks was Audrey Cable with 5 and Conley with 3 points. Rounding out the scoring was Morris and Chloe Peters with 2 apiece.
“This is a big win for us against a strong MAC squad,” Coach Moore said. “Belle Cable was outstanding as she made all four of her 3-point attempts and scored a career-high 18 points. Our free throws proved to be the difference again as we practice them in game-like scenarios. We were able to match their runs and control the tempo of the game. Our defense continues to get better, and we had three different players in double figures. However, we will be working on our rebounding at 8 a.m.”
Belle Cable led Franklin Monroe with her game-high 18 points, Conley scored 12, Audrey Cable 11, Morris 4, Goins 3 and Peters 2.
Nikki Keller led St. Henry with 17 points, Allison Siefring scored 8, Danielle Lange 7, Carleigh Deitsch scored 4, Alexis Ontrop 3, Addy Vaughn 3 and Kendra Rose 1.
