Lansing Community College's women's basketball wraps up impressive first half of season with close loss to ranked foe
LANSING – Lansing Community College’s women’s basketball team hasn’t spent much time trailing this season.
It’s been a banner start for a young roster and first-year LCC head coach Megan Hudson. So when the Stars found themselves trailing 21-10 after the first quarter Tuesday night against the best team they’ve played — unbeaten and 16th-ranked Mid-Michigan College — it was easy to wonder if the game might get out of hand.
Instead, LCC suffered a loss, 72-63, perhaps as strong as many of their 11 wins already — one that forced the Stars to show some grit and character, take a punch and stay on their feet.
“I felt like we saw them going on a run for a minute and we were able to kind of keep our composure, not freak out,” LCC freshman guard Ellie Humble said. “I think we knew we could come back with making smarter plays and actually slowing our offense down.”
The Stars finished their pre-Christmas slate 11-3, losing for the first time at home Tuesday. This, coming off back to back six-win seasons. That was with mostly a different roster. Hudson, an assistant the previous two seasons, brought in nine freshmen, eight of them from the Lansing area, including Humble, from Haslett, who along with fellow freshman Peyton Anderson (DeWitt) and sophomore Shalyn Dziewiatkowski (Portland) led the LCC in scoring Tuesday with 11 points apiece. Dziewiatkowski also tallied a team-high 10-rebounds for the Stars, who never could pull closer than a seven-point margin that seemed to taunt them most of the second half.
LCC wasn’t quite full strength, which didn’t help. Anderson played just 17 minutes in her first game back after missing three games with an ankle injury and freshman center Kara Bartels — the Stars' leading scorer (18.2 ppg) and rebounder (9.6) — played through an illness, scoring nine points and grabbing seven rebounds.
Their opponent didn't cut them any slack.
“They could drive and shoot. On offense, they had multiple threats,” LCC freshman Bailey Hosford, of Holt, said of a Mid-Michigan team that hit 7 of 12 3-point attempts and was led by Rachel Resio’s four triples and 26 points and Terre'ya Moore’s 15 points and 18 rebounds.
“Our girls never stopped fighting,” Stars coach Megan Hudson said. “We found the holes in their press. … Offensively, if you've seen our box scores, you know we haven't really put up a high number of points. We typically are shutdown defenders. That's really where we thrive in our game. So today we struggled offensively getting into our normal flow and that hampered (our defense).”
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LCC resumes play on Jan. 6 at home against Olivet JV, before a home date with Grand Rapids Community College on Jan. 10 and diving into its conference schedule, beginning at home against Glen Oaks Community College on Jan. 13.
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Contact Graham Couch at gcouch@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @Graham_Couch
This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: LCC women's basketball wraps up impressive first half of season
