By Murray Gleffe, Correspondent

ASHWAUBENON- The Ashwaubenon Jaguar girls’ basketball team opened up Fox River Classic Conference play (Nov. 30) with a win over the Green Bay Preble Hornets by a final of 58-44.

Autumn Schlader led the Jaguars with 25 points.

Hayden Kupsh and Maddie Koch each added 8 points.

Jaguar players Hayden Kupsh and Peyton Wright prepare for a rebound

“I am proud of Autumn for her all-out hustle plays that she made today,“ said Nicky VanLaanen, Jaguar Girls Basketball Coach. “She was confident in her ability and made the shots that I know she is capable of making.”

For the game, the Jaguars connected on as many free throws (18) as they did field goals.

The Jaguars and Hornets both started the game ice cold from the field.

In addition, three turnovers by each team left the game scoreless through the first 3:04 of the contest.

Finally, the Hornets got on the board with a pair of free throws.

The Jaguars got off the snide almost five minutes in when Senior Guard Peyton Wright drained a three pointer from the left sidelines.

After the rough start shooting the ball, both teams seemed to settle into the game.

With the Jaguars leading 14-11, Schlader started her onslaught for the Jaguars.

She connected on a lay-up and then hit two free throws to extend the Jaguar lead to 18-13 with 3:38 left in the first half.

The Hornets stayed in the game with the strong perimeter play of Kristan Molling who had 8 first half points.

Meanwhile, the Jaguars closed the half on a spurt with Schlader scoring the last four points to put the Jaguars up 26-19 heading into intermission.

The Jaguars enjoyed their biggest lead of the game (32-19) with 15:28 left after Schlader made an aggressive move to the basket putting the bucket home.

The Hornets immediately called time out to try and stunt the Jaguar momentum that had built up over the past several minutes.

Hornets Center Kendall Renard, who had been held scoreless to that point, then got going in the paint. She hit five consecutive shots. When she wasn’t scoring, she kicked the ball out to Molling for perimeter makes.

All of a sudden, the double digit lead the Jaguars once had was trimmed to 38-34 with 9:48 left in the game.

At that point, the Jaguars knew what had happened to them at West De Pere on Monday evening, and didn’t want any part of blowing a lead on their home court.

“I thought we did a tremendous job for the first 20 or so minutes in defending Renard,” added VanLaanen. “She is a tremendous player and we knew going in we had to execute our game plan and be tough in the paint.”

The Jaguars ended any notion of a Hornets comeback when they went on a ‘game defining’ 12-2 run to put them back up 50-36 with 5:18 left.

During that big run, the Jaguars received a huge lift from their bench.

Kally VanLaanen and Lydia Schaible each contributed six points during that span.

The teams exchanged baskets down the stretch and the Jaguars went onto capture the game by 14 points.

The Jaguars improve to 2-2 overall and 1-0 in the FRCC. They will be back in action Dec. 5 at Sheboygan South.

“I am proud at how resilient the girls were when Preble made that run to cut our lead to four points,“ said VanLaanen. “We did not want a repeat performance of Monday and I challenged the kids to win the game down the stretch and they responded by doing just that.”

Green Bay Preble/Ashwaubenon Box Score

Green Bay Preble  19, 25, 44

Ashwaubenon        26, 32  58

Hornet Totals: FG’s 15-48, 3 PT FG’s 2-15, FT’s 12-15, Rebounds 23, Assists 9, Steals 5, Blocks 3, Turnovers 16, Personal Fouls 24

Molling 15, Renard 10, Duffney 6, Stahl 6, Luther 5, Winzenried 2

Jaguar Totals: FG’s 18-39, 3 PT FG’s 4-12, FT’s 18-24, Rebounds 24, Assists 12, Steals 9, Blocks 4, Turnovers 17, Personal Fouls 15

Schlader 25, Kupsh 8, Koch 8, Servais 6, VanLaanen 5, Wright 3, Schaible 2, Steinhoff 1

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