Goddard girls get second win in less than 24 hours

The turnaround was short for the Goddard girls basketball team — a little less than 18 hours — from its Friday night game. Coach Kevin Hackerott didn’t bother much with a scouting report for Heights, Goddard’s Saturday morning opponent at Koch Arena.

Goddard relied mostly on its determination to grind out a 48-38 victory to improve to 7-2.

“We were tired mentally, tired physically,” Hackerott said. “To be able to come back and play at 11 in the morning and have success against a really good team from the City League like Heights, I’m really proud of my girls. We will take it.”

Making things even more difficult was the unique matchup that Heights presents with its tendency to play five guards. Hackerott didn’t feel comfortable turning to his bench under those circumstances, so Goddard’s five starters played every minute of the second half.

After Heights took a 13-11 lead after the first quarter, Goddard was able to sink its defense into Heights and slow the tempo down to where the Lions are more comfortable playing.

“I felt like especially in the second half we got in our system and in our tempo,” Hackerott said. “And we’re pretty good in that arena.”

Goddard slowly built its lead, turning a 24-21 halftime advantage into an 11-point lead in the third quarter thanks to four three-pointers from Torri Vang.

Heights was never able to string enough offense together to make a serious run at the lead. Tania Lowe scored 16 points to lead the Falcons (5-4).

“We just worked really well as a team,” said Vang, who scored a season-high 16 points. “I couldn’t have made any of those points without my team. They did a great job of setting me up, making great screens and passing me the ball.”

This story was originally published January 14, 2017 at 4:07 PM with the headline "Goddard girls get second win in less than 24 hours."