Sunday, February 10, 2013

The End of the Lehi Froggie Girls' Home Seaon

Timp Sports Weekly
February 11, 2013


Publisher's Message

This week's issue looks at the final two home games of the Lehi Pioneer girls' basketball season. Those two games presented Lehi fans their final chances to see Troy Gifford, Lehi's head girls' basketball coach, mentor his players at home. He had resigned recently for reasons I won't go into here. Don't worry, the reasons didn't involve any inappropriate behavior on his part. He's a decent guy. He has simply decided to move on doing other things. Anyway, the games we will look at in this issue will be the ones that the Pioneers, AKA the Froggies, played against the Bingham Miners, AKA the Pickers, and the Ferocious Pleasant Grove Vikings. As they say in Lehi, let's row straight to those stories.

Dean Von Memmott
Publisher
magnanovelist@gmail.com

Bingham Pickers Cave In Lehi Froggies 50-28
By Dean Von Memmott
Timp Sports Weekly Publisher

In Region Four girls' basketball at Lehi Feb. 5, the Bingham Miners, AKA the Pickers, caved the Lehi Pioneers, AKA the Froggies, 50-28.

Even though the Feb. 5 was the Froggies' second-to-the-last home game of the season, they still marked it as Senior Night. So Lehi Coach Troy Gifford had five of his seniors serve as starters in the game. Gifford's underclassman starters came in a little bit later in the game.

In the meantime, the Froggies had a difficult time in hopping onto the scoreboard. An Emily Anderson trey sent the Pickers digging their way out to a 13-0 lead. True to his usual strategy, Bingham Rand Rasmussen employed two quintets of Pickers to throw the Froggies off their game. As Pickers Madison Aulai-Roe, Kenzie Bruggerman, and Ashton Henderson took firm control of the boards, questions abounded about whether the Froggies would get onto the scoreboard before the end the first quarter.  Thirty seconds before the first-quarter break, Tyra "T-Rod" Rodriguez produced a three-point play to put Lehi on the board. A "distant cousin" of late pop singer Diane Washington, Monique Washington hit an inside shot that left Bingham ahead 15-3 at the end of the first quarter.

In the second quarter, Gifford employed the use of his regular, underclassman first-stringers like Reesie Tua and Faitoto'a Faleao. However, the Pickers held the Froggies to four points in the second quarter. Meanwhile, Picker fans cheered at seeing Jilian Powell and Whitney Daniels sink treys that fueled an 11-4 scoring run for Bingham during the quarter.

After a Powell trey improved the Bingham lead at 29-7 at the start of the third period, Rodriguez hit an inside shot that launched a brief 6-4 scoring run for the Froggies. Faleao started becoming hot in her shooting during the third quarter. Aided by Brooklyn Willes, Micala Downs, Kylie Bartholemew, and Beth Beeston, Faleao proved to be hard for Bingham to shut down during the second half. Faleao's efforts couldn't shift the game back to Lehi's favor. Through efforts of Carynn Duke, Cheril Lyman, Henderson, and Powell, Bingham managed to keep its lead in double figures throughout the entire second half, even though the Froggies outscored them 12-9 in the final quarter. Froggie Megan Nelson hit a last-minute shot to give Lehi something to cheer about.

Faleao led the Froggies with 10 points while Rodriguez added another five. Powell led the Pickers with 12 points while Anderson and Daniels each added another seven.

Ferocious PG Vikings Drain Lehi Froggies 55-43 in Feb. 7 Girls' Hoop Showdown
By Dean Von Memmott
Timp Sports Weekly Publisher

In a Region Four girls' basketball showdown at Lehi Feb. 7, the Ferocious Pleasant Grove Vikings drained up the Lehi Pioneers, AKA the Froggies, 55-43.

The road win at Lehi earn the Ferocious the privilege of playing at this year's state 5-A girls' basketball tournament. For a little while, the Froggies looked as though they would wash away the Ferocious Vikings like they did the Lone Peak Knights, AKA the Loners, a few weeks ago.

Ferocious Viking Megan Wilde opened the game's scoring with an inside shot. Even though Froggie sophomore Faitoto'a "To'a" Faleao tied the game at two, the Ferocious Vikings rowed ahead 5-2 on a Hailey Albretch foul shot and a Lilly "Sego" Evans jump shot. Kaylie Bartholemew put a shot back in, hoping  to prod her Froggies into jumping out in front of Pleasant Grove. However, a Rachel Eldredge trey improved the Ferocious Viking lead at 8-4. The Froggies appeared at that point destined to be drained by the Ferocious Vikings. However, Beeston hit a crucial trey for the Froggies. Making an offensive rebound, Reesie Tua put Lehi ahead 9-8 near the end of the first quarter.

Early in the second quarter, Tua sank a layup during a steal, improving the Froggies' advantage at 11-8.  Pleasant Grove seemed doomed like Lone Peak did when the Loners played at Lehi last month. Pleasant Grove Coach Glenn"Record Hop" Larson said, "We began playing great defense. They had a hard time with getting the ball to To'a. That enabled us to snatch the momentum from them."

CiCi Alder hit an inside shot that tipped the momentum back to the Ferocious Vikings' favor. Two McKenna Miles foul shots nudged the Ferocious Vikings ahead 12-11. That lead didn't last long for Pleasant Grove. A recent addition to the Froggies' varsity roster, Nicki Fitz hit a three-pointer that put them leaping ahead 14-12. A Mile trey restored the lead to Pleasant Grove. The Ferocious Vikings held Lehi to one point during the second quarter's final four minutes. Meanwhile, Miles' foul shooting a 25-15 lead that the Ferocious Vikings took with them into the second half.

With the Ferocious Vikings keeping Faleao from scoring into double figures, the Froggies had to look for other crackshots to enable them to hop back into the game. Beth Beeston became Lehi's main shooter for the night. Beeeston's work got undermined by the combined efforts of Evans and Miles. Together, those two players enabled Pleasant Grove to maintain a double-figure lead throughout the entire second half, which saw some great rebounding from Ferocious Vikings Jessica Matheson and Eldredge.

In the final quarter, Sam Slater, Bartholemew, and Brooklyn Willes joined Beeston in a shooting spree that saw the Froggies outscore the Ferocious Vikings 14-9. However, the bad second quarter proved to be too much for Lehi to recover from.

Beeston led the Froggies with 13 points while Faleao and Bartholemew each added another eight. Miles led Pleasant Grove with 21 points while Evans added another 13.

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