Two nights after seeing a 10-point fourth-quarter lead slip away against North Henderson, Polk County made certain there would be no repeat against Owen.
A tough practice on Tuesday and a healthy dose of Hayley Kropp on Wednesday assured that as Polk County outscored visiting Owen 19-8 in the game’s final five minutes to claim a 52-37 victory in a Western Highlands Conference matchup.
Kropp delivered perhaps her best performance of the season, scoring 17 points, grabbing 17 rebounds and handing out eight assists in narrowly missing a triple-double. She had seven points in the fourth quarter, including a 3-pointer that gave Polk County (8-6, 2-3) a 43-31 cushion with less than three minutes remaining and was the rare basket in a quarter that saw the two teams shoot a combined 27 free throws.
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Some of those fouls could be attributed to the Wolverines’ defensive efforts, which were aggressive and constant from the outset. Not happy with how her squad handled North Henderson’s movement and screens away from the ball on Monday, head coach Brandy Alm stressed defense throughout Tuesday’s practice. That effort showed Wednesday, especially early as Polk raced to a 15-4 lead late in the first quarter.
“That’s basically all we worked on in practice,” Alm said. “We didn’t concentrate enough and it showed on Monday night. North Henderson got a lot of easy looks and a lot of easy baskets. We wanted to make sure that didn’t happen tonight, so it was a focal point at practice.”
Similar to Monday’s loss, Polk County held the lead early in the fourth period, this time at 35-26, and watched its opponent make a run. Owen (6-10, 2-4) scored the first five points of the fourth to whittle the Wolverine margin down to 33-29 with 5:08 left. Autumn Owen then scored for Polk, driving the lane for a basket, and Kropp scored a few seconds later off an inbounds pass to boost the lead back to 37-29 with 4:32 left.
Owen got the deficit back to six, 37-31, before Owen hit a free throw, Kara Overholt hit two and then Kropp nailed the 3-pointer to end Owen’s comeback hopes.
“I felt like Monday night we played not to lose,” Alm said of the team’s fourth-quarter performance. “Monday night was an eye-opening experience for us.
“The adjustments they made tonight showed they are listening. They did what we asked them to do and what we worked on. We were able to take care of the basketball and take good shots and play our game.”
Continuing a recent run of solid outside shooting, Overholt had 17 points, including a pair of 3-pointers, and had six assists. Sarah Phipps had 10 points and 11 rebounds while Ashley Kropp had nine rebounds.
Polk County travels to Hendersonville on Friday to wrap up the first half of its WHC schedule.
Polk County Scoring
Hayley Kropp 17, Kara Overholt 17, Sarah Phipps 10, Autumn Owen 5, Savannah Ross 2, Ashley Kropp 1
