Lady Leps Lose 2nd Straight, Fall to Minerva 45-41

Minerva 45, Louisville 41

The Lady Leopards (13-2, 8-2) lost their second straight NBC game, to the Minerva Lions (10-4, 7-3) 45-41, on Wednesday night.  Brianna Libertore led Louisville with 14 points and 8 rebounds, while Molly Brown added 13 points, but it was not enough to overcome the Lions stellar three-point shooting and staunch defense.

Minerva came out of the gate hot getting a three-pointer from Ann Marie Soles and then a bucket in the lane by Chelsie Butler to take a 5-0 lead.  After Libertore banked home a shot, Soles hit another triple to extend the Lions lead to 6.  But, Louisville clawed back to take the lead at 10-8.  Libertore hit a layup and completed the three-point play at the line, Brown hit home a three-pointer, and Alyssa Jones made a smooth lay-in off a fast break.

The Lions responded to the Leopards run with aggressive defense.  Butler had a pair of blocks down low and the Lions finished the quarter with a 14-12 lead.  Butler also finished with a game-high 9 rebounds on the evening to go along with 8 points.  Butler now has 1,229 for her career, which broke Deb Moyer’s quarter of a century old record for the most points in Minerva girls basketball history.

Brown canned a deep two to start the Leopards off in the second quarter, but Brittany Phelps answered right back for Minerva with a trey.  Brown then sunk another long two, but the Lions followed that up with a 10-2 run that extended into the second half.  However, Louisville managed to cut the lead to 31-25 before the horn sounded to end the third period.

In the final quarter, Taylor Maurer buried a three-pointer to give the Lions a 34-25 lead. Louisville countered with a pair of Mackenzie Storlie free throws and a pair of Jones layups to cut the deficit to 3.  But Minerva fired right back getting a long two from Mauer.  Then Mayson Hardgrove dropped in a layup and hit the “and one” at the charity stripe.  Kassidy Hardgrove followed that up with a layup of her own and all of the sudden Minerva had their biggest lead of the game at 41-31.

Louisville then scored the next 7 points on a Brown three-pointer and pairs of free throws by both Libertore and Storlie.  But with 1:16 remaining Maurer got open and delivered a huge dagger into the Leopards by netting one from downtown in the corner.

Two missed 1-and-1 free throws by the Lions and a three-pointer from Brown made things interesting.  But, Kassidy Hardgrove made the first of two free throws with 6.5 remaining to seal the Leopards fate.  The Lady Lions went home with the 45-41 victory.

STATISTICS:

LEOPARDS: Libertore 5 4-7 14, 5 0-0 13,  4 0-2 8, Storlie 0 4-4 4, C. Lemmon 1 0-0 2, TOTALS 15 8-13 41.

3PT (3): Brown (3)

TEAM FT: 8-13 62%

REBOUNDS: 36 – Libertore 8

LIONS: K. Hardgrove 2 5-8 9, Butler 2 4-4 8, Maurer 3 0-0 8, M. Hardgrove 3 1-1 7, Soles 2 0-0 6, Mihok 2 0-0 4, Miller 1 0-0 3, TOTALS 15 10-13 45.

3PT (5): Maurer (2), Soles (2), Miller (1)

TEAM FT: 10-13 77%

REBOUNDS: 29 – Butler 9

NEXT GAME: The Leopards will host Alliance on Saturday, January 29.  JV will tip-off at 11:00 AM, while Varsity will follow starting at approximately 12:30 PM.  These times have been moved from their originally scheduled times.

JV REPORT:

Louisville 42, Minerva 26

Chandler Rice led the Lady Leps with 13 points and Jordan Monnot score all 10 of her points in the second half as the JV Squad cruised past Minerva 42-26.  After taking a 17-12 halftime lead, Louisville outscored Minerva 13-8 in the third quarter and 12-6 in the fourth quarter to roll to the double digit victory.  The Lady Leps are now 13-2 on the season.  Shania Miller led the Lions with 10.