By Rob Potter
LAKE HUNTINGTON — January 6, 2006 – It was close in the early going.
During the first quarter and into the opening minutes of the second period of Wednesday night’s non-league basketball game between The Family School Lady Falcons and the host Sullivan West Lady Bulldogs, the scoreboard showed the home team trying to expand upon a small lead.
Two free throws by senior center April Ackermann gave the Lady Bulldogs a 13-4 advantage with 2:25 remaining in the opening stanza. Two minutes later, freshman forward/center Rachel Houghtaling scored inside the lane to give SW a 15-6 lead.
But with 6:17 left in the second period, The Family School’s Kristin Schroeder made 1-of-2 free throws to pull the Lady Falcons to within four points at 15-11.
From that point on, however, SW (5-2) outscored The Family School (2-6) by a 49 to 6 margin to record a 64-17 win.
Leading the Lady Bulldogs to the victory were sophomore forward Sarah Lander, who had a game-high 16 points and eight rebounds, and Houghtaling, who netted 14 points and also grabbed eight rebounds.
SW’s Kate Fanning scored 10 points and dished out nine assists and Ackermann finished with eight points and five rebounds.
The Lady Bulldogs were 13-of-17 (76 percent) at the free-throw line.
“We got some early looks [at the basket] and our offense seemed to flow pretty well,” SW Coach Ron Bernhardt said. “Sarah Lander was really impressive with her defense tonight.
“We played well as a team and had good balance offensively,” Bernhardt added.
That balance to which the veteran coach alluded was demonstrated by the fact that eight Lady Bulldogs scored at least two points in the contest.
Julie Lyons scored a team-high six points for The Family School.
“We had some good moments,” said Cora Thomason, who serves as co-captain of the Lady Falcons along with Katherine Ryman. “But in the second, third and fourth quarters we stayed stagnant.”
“I think we can play a lot better than we did tonight,” commented Schroeder, who is the Lady Falcons’ captain. “We’ll be OK for the rest of the season.”