BOB ETTINGER
GENEVA — Smart guard play on offense and strong defense early cleared the way for the Geneva girls basketball team to lower its hammers against Riverside on Saturday night.
When the dust settled, the Eagles owned a 74-28 Premier Athletic Conference victory over Riverside.
Audra Puckrin tallied six first-quarter points — fouron buckets after steals — as the Eagles (10-3, 8-1) took a 14-8 lead after eight minutes. The next eight minutes, though, belonged to the Geneva frontcourt.
The Eagles used a 19-0 run to outscore the Beavers (1-12, 1-8), 24-3, in the second quarter. They made nine steals and had nine assists and forced 17 turnovers in 16 minutes.
“We’ve put a lot of emphasis on defense, we do every day, but it’s been a much bigger focus lately,” Geneva coach Nancy Barbo said. “They wanted to show things have hit home a little bit on what we’ve focused on in practice.
“Taylor (Webb) is key in the press. When she touches the ball, it results in steals for the guards. That gave us momentum and we ran with it.”
“They are a fast, athletic and disciplined team and they get after it on both sides of the ball,” Riverside coach Drew Hartmann said. “They came out with a lot of speed and energy and forced a lot of turnovers.”
Geneva led, 37-14, at the break and was16 of 30 (53.3 percent) from the field.
“Initially, I wasn’t happy with our shot selection and patience on offense,” Barbo said. “After we started reversing the ball and penetrating wisely, it opened things up inside. Plus, we got better shots from the outside, too.”
“They’re such a balanced team,” Hartmann said. “We tried to come out in a zone and put people around their bigs. But their guards got hot. In the first half, they shot extremely well.
“That was compounded by our turnovers against the press that led to easy buckets. They just came out and played a great first half all the way around.”
Puckrin (3 steals) and Courtney Thompson (3 rebounds, 2 assists, 2 steals) each scored six points and Jillian Nazor — all guards — added five points in the half.
Posts Natalie Stanley netted 10 points and Webb added eight in the paint.
Despite getting some open looks, the Beavers were just 5 of 21 (23.8 percent) from the field in the first half.
“Our kids played extremely hard,” Hartmann said. “In the first half, we had some good looks, they just didn’t go down. In the first half, they made shots and we didn’t. We executed well and had some good looks in the first half.
“If a couple go down, at halftime it’s a much closer basketball game. We moved the ball well and we had good execution, the ball just didn’t go down.”
The Eagles opened the third quarter with a different emphasis — pounding the ball down into the paint. It worked beautifully.
Webb (10 points), Stanley (6 points) and Ashley Meaney (2 points) combined to score 18 of the Eagles’ 24 points in the period. Thompson scored the other six on a pair of 3-pointers.
“That’s what we emphasized at halftime,” Barbo said. “Sometimes, when the posts get taken away, we forget about them completely. We didn’t want that to happen. We talked about that at halftime.
“Riverside came out and played a nice zone. But we were patient on offense and things opened up inside.”
