MIDDLETOWN, Ind. —
Back in November, the Frankton girls basketball team handled Shenandoah by 29 points.
Tuesday’s sectional opener at Shenandoah wasn’t as easy, but the end result was the same as Frankton moved on with a 44-43 win over the host Shenandoah Raiders.
Shenandoah had a chance to tie the game in the closing seconds, but a potential game-tying 3-pointer rimmed out with just over four seconds remaining.
“They couldn’t have played any harder,” Shenandoah coach Chelsea Kilian said of her team. “If they can look at their teammates and know they gave it all that they had, that’s all you can ask for.”
The 29-point victory in November and the Eagles’ better record may cause some eyebrows to be raised at the one-point margin of victory, but Frankton coach Dean Riddle’s eyebrows will stay in place.
“We’re not the first team to ever have a mental letdown against a team you beat by 29 (points) during the (regular) season,” he said. “You can’t take anything away from Shenandoah. I told Chelsea that I saw them play four times this year, and every time they got better. It didn’t show in the win-loss record, but if you come to see them play and you know anything about the game, you could see they were getting better.”
The biggest lead of the game was a six-point edge for either squad. Frankton’s largest advantage was at 38-32 in the third quarter. Shenandoah held an 11-5 lead at the end of the first quarter.
The Raiders got two buckets each from Rachel Krathwohl and McKenna Resler in the first period. All five points from Frankton came from junior Kelsey Key.
Shenandoah used multiple zones to key in on Key, Frankton’s leading scorer.
“The defenses we saw tonight, we’ve seen all year long. We didn’t execute against it, but Shenadoah had a lot to do with that,” Riddle said. “We survive and go on.”
Frankton opened the fourth quarter with a 36-32 lead. The Eagles came out in a press defense to speed up the game against the Raiders and to try and jumpstart their own energy.
“We tried to press early in the fourth to try and change that tempo a little bit, and we weren’t very successful,” Riddle said. “That’s not a tempo we dislike. We looked flat because we were flat, that’s all.”
Frankton only scored eight points in the final quarter of play. The Eagles’ last field goal came in the form of a 3-pointer by freshman Katie Key with 3:21 to play.
Kelsey Key led all scorers with 26 points, 15 in the first half. Sophomore Carleigh Tucker scored 14 for the Eagles.
Shenandoah was led by 14 points from junior center Breann Dunigan.
The Raiders end the year at 5-16 and graduate just one senior, Jessica Davenport.
Frankton (10-12) will play the Winchester Golden Falcons (16-5) on Friday at 6 p.m. in the first semifinal of the evening.
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Frankton Eagle Kelsey Key shoots over Shenandoah defenders during Sectional action play. David Humphrey / The Associated Press
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