MONTEZUMA – Claire Erselius dropped in 26 points, Vivian Cook scored 18 and the Bravettes crashed the offensive boards as Montezuma beat Keota 53-25 on Friday evening, Dec. 19, at home.
The Bravettes came in rated 11th in Class 1A, but Keota has climbed to 14th, which is a heady move for that program, so the Bravettes had to be executing the basics. And they were.
Senior guard Erselius has been in somewhat of a shooting slump recently, but she broke out big-time. Claire connected on 9-of-19 from the field and 5-for-6 from the free throw line on her way to 26.
Those shooting totals included three-for-eight from three-point range, to which Erselius added 5 rebounds, 2 assists and 3 steals.
Cook was a little better from behind the arc – 4-for-9, on her way to 18 points. She added five rebounds.
A big highlight for the Bravettes was grabbing 31 rebounds with 25 of them coming off the offensive glass. That gave Montezuma more time on offense, and frustrated Keota’s plans.
With all those extra shot attempts, Montezuma still shot .409 from the field, which is a decent percentage for this Bravettes team.
Junior post player Syd Burgess led Montezuma rebounders with 12 caroms. Although she didn’t have a big scoring night, Burgess led the team with 4 assists and had 2 blocks and 2 assists.
Montezuma’s defense was in-your-face tough. The Bravettes limited Keota to single digit scoring in all four quarters. Montezuma led 28-16 at halftime and ran off and hid during a 17-2 third quarter.
The Bravettes went to 6-1 overall on the season, which includes 6-0 against league opponents.
Keota fell to 3-3 overall.
SCORE BY QUARTERS
Keota 9 7 2 7 – 25
Montezuma 16 12 17 8 – 53
Line score legend: field goals made-attempted, free throws made-attempted, personal fouls, total points
MONTEZUMA (53) – Vivian Cook 5-13, 4-5, 2, 18; Syd Burgess 1-5, 1-4, 3, 3; Claire Erselius 9-19, 5-6, 0, 26; Lauryn Larmore 1-4, 0-2, 4, 2; Sophia Semprini 2-2, 0-0, 1, 4; Alexa Rose 0-0, 0-0, 0, 0; Molly Jones 0-1, 0-0, 2, 0; Letisia Wilson 0-0, 0-2, 1, 0. TOTALS – 18-44, 10-19, 13, 56.
Turnovers: 14.
Rebounds: Montezuma 31 (Burgess 12, Semprini 6, Cook 5, Erselius 5, Larmore 3).
Assists: 8 (Burgess 4, Erselius 2, Rose 1, Jones 1).
Steals: 9 Erselius 3, Burgess 2, Larmore 1, Rose 2, Wilson 1)
Blocks: 3 (Burgess 2, Wilson 1).