Women can't hold lead; fall to KVCC

By Jayden Hewitt
Sports Editor

The LCC women’s basketball team dropped a close game at home vs. Kalamazoo Valley Community College, 65-58, on Wednesday, Jan. 18.

The loss marked a sixth straight for the Lady Stars, in a game that saw LCC jump out to a large lead at halftime and lose it in the second half.

LCC Head Coach Layne Ingram spoke to the difference in the first and second half.

“I think we just went away from (where) we were getting success at,” Ingram said. “We had a game plan of how we wanted to execute on offense; we had a game-plan for how we wanted to execute on defense.”

“For the first 27 minutes, we certainly did that, the last 13 is where it really matters. There are things to build on. (It was) certainly frustrating and disappointing to not pull that one out.”

Freshman guard Olivia Gean led LCC in scoring with 12 points, while guard Jasmine Goins and guard/forward Shalyn Dziewiatkowski both added 10 points each for the Stars.

Injuries still remain a factor, but Ingram said he believes there’s still plenty of players to win basketball games.

“I got a couple of kids, even one of the kids that played tonight, she’s hurt, (she) has an ankle injury,” Ingram said. “We hope to get Ely (Elysia Causley) back the first week of February; that’s just a big loss. That’s 15 to 20 points a game and six to eight rebounds, that’s a big loss, so we need to get them back. But we still had enough. There’s still more than enough (players) to win that game.”

The loss drops LCC to 3-11 on the year, and 0-2 in the conference, after dropping the first conference game of the season at Glen Oaks Community College on Jan 14, 74-54.

The Lady Stars will look to snap their losing skid in another conference bid at Ancilla College on Saturday, Jan 21.