“She can shoot it from anywhere and we got caught on the screens,” Fairmont coach Jeremy Finn said. “We just didn’t do a great job trying to defend it.”
George made three 3-pointers in the third quarter and her second one was so deep that the Firebirds (5-2, 3-2 GWOC) didn’t figure they needed go out to guard her. Her final three put the Elks (7-1, 5-0) up 41-24 with 4:01 left.
“Beginning of the season I wasn’t shooting very well, so it felt good to get back on my game and have a good night shooting,” said George, who entered the game shooting 27.4% (17 of 62) from 3-point range.
“She’s been guarded every which way, so some games it’s been rough,” said Elks coach Adam Priefer. “But she doesn’t stop competing and playing at the highest level. She realizes things are going to start going her way.”
George averaged nine points a game as a freshman and eight as a sophomore when the Elks were led by Amy Velasco, now playing at Bowling Green, and Cotie McMahon, who will play at Ohio State. This year she needs to take on a bigger scoring load and entered the game averaging 13.1 points.
“It’s definitely different because I had Amy and Cotie on my team last year, so I was just chillin’,” George said. “Now I am more of a person that needs to score, but I’m taking advantage of it and looking to score when I can to help out the team.”
Priefer said his team prepared well for the game, and George said the team was especially hyped and ready.
“They play hard every night, but tonight they played exceptionally hard,” Priefer said. “This is a rivalry and that means a little something to everybody.”
Megan Taylor added 11 points and Molly Scott nine for the Elks. Priefer credited Kaitlyn Palomino’s defensive effort against Fairmont leading scorer Mallory Hullinger, who scored all six of her points in the second half.
Serena Baker scored 17 points inside for Fairmont, but the Firebirds didn’t make any 3-pointers. The Elks’ plan was to pressure Fairmont’s guards enough to keep the ball away from Baker and other post players as much as possible and in turn limit 3-point attempts.
“We’re starting to put little things together, and defensively we were pretty solid today,” Priefer said. “I feel like the kids played like they were on a little bit of a mission today.”
The Elks forced 18 turnovers and kept the Firebirds out of sync. It didn’t help the Firebirds that they missed eight of their first nine free throws and finished 8 of 19.
“Anything that could go wrong it was one of those nights where it was just going wrong,” Finn said. “Centerville plays fundamentally sound, and we didn’t take care of business the way we should have.”
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