FRANKLIN — Emma Adolph has seen a noticeable change on the court — and inside the huddle — for the Monroe High School girls basketball team.
It showed Thursday night.
Adolph and fellow teammate Ryan Buskirk each scored a game-high 12 points, and the Hornets held the host Franklin Wildcats scoreless in the second and third quarters on the way to a 33-7 Southwestern Buckeye League Southwestern Division victory.
“It’s really because we’ve all been playing together as a family a lot more than just at the beginning of the season,” said Adolph, who emphasized that Monroe has brought back an old huddle chant.
“We’ve just been playing more as a family, and it’s really helped us communicate a lot better on the court. We’ve been able to play with each other. It’s been a lot smoother ever since the beginning of the season.”
Things looked different the first meeting when Franklin snapped an eight-game losing streak to Monroe in a 34-32 contest on Dec. 7.
“We didn’t play very well, and they played well the first time,” Monroe second-year coach Justin Clemmons said. “We felt like we were the better basketball team, but we had to come out and do it — which is what I told them tonight.
“We wanted to leave no doubt. Franklin and Monroe is a big-time rivalry — both teams want to get it. But we kind of wanted to leave no doubt that we were the better basketball team tonight.”
Monroe’s defense prevented Franklin from doing just about anything Thursday. The Hornets led 8-2 after the first quarter and didn’t allow the Wildcats to score for over 20 minutes.
“It’s kind of what we do,” Clemmons said. “I wish we scored 60 points a game and did that, but I think teams know that when they show up, they’re going to have to play a defense that’s pretty good. We try to hang our hat on that.
“Obviously, if we could score 50 points I would take it in a heartbeat, but we kind of do what we do. We play defense, and we score when we get opportunities to. I love the defensive end of the floor, so them buying into it is a lot of fun.”
Monroe (4-8, 2-4 SWBL) was the better team inside the paint due to size. Adolph and Buskirk — both juniors — along with freshman Ellie Buskirk, were a big part of that.
Ellie Buskirk had a game-high eight rebounds, while Adolph grabbed six and Ryan Buskirk four.
“We want to dominate the offensive boards and dominate the glass completely,” Clemmons said. “With them being able to do that, they should.”
Sophomore Ellie Whaley scored Franklin’s two points in the first quarter before knocking down a free throw in the fourth to finish with three. Freshman Ashlin Hurst and sophomore Bryley Wulff added two points apiece in the final quarter for the Wildcats (2-9, 1-4 SWBL), who lost their fifth in a row.
“They came out obviously more aggressive, more physical, more ready to play,” Franklin third-year coach Matt Abshear said. “Credit to the coaches from Monroe. Absolutely fantastic. They were locked in ready to go. They kind of came out, we kind of turned the ball over a little early. Missed some shots, they hit some shots, and I just had this sense that we were not ready to get off the mat a little there — kind of slow coming out.
“Then I think it’s one of those things where when one shot didn’t go, there’s no 14-point bucket out there to get. And then you’re pressing a little bit, you’re shooting off balance, you’re throwing the ball around instead of doing some of the things that we tried to work on.”
Missing leading scorer Olivia Truesdell didn’t help. The junior hasn’t played the last three games — including Thursday night — because of a thumb injury. Truesdell leads the Wildcats with 12.3 points and 4.0 rebounds a game.
“She’s our best scorer. That’s without question,” Abshear said. “When you have an injury, you kind of want to have that next man up mentality. When you’re trying to grow and develop a program, sometimes the next man up isn’t always ready for that position to be there. So obviously that’s a huge loss for us when she’s not in the game. Just her ability to score the ball is huge.”
Abshear said he isn’t sure when Truesdell could see the court next and will “err on the side of caution and let it take some time to heal rather than kind of rush back.”
On Monroe’s end, Clemmons said despite having not having a senior on the roster, he’s pleased with how his program has progressed throughout the season.
“I think we’re better than what our record says it is,” Clemmons said. “We’ve played some good teams. We’ve let some go that we shouldn’t have. But I think we have a chance here to turn things around in the second half of the season.
“I thought tonight was the first time we played 32 minutes. I told them coming out of the half was huge, and we scored 16 points in the third — kind of turned it on. I’m excited to see what we’ve got here the next 10 games left.”
Franklin will look to bounce back against two of the SWBL Buckeye Division’s best teams — at Waynesville this Saturday and home versus Brookville next Saturday.
“When we talked to the girls back there, I kind of said the same thing. This is all me,” Abshear said when asked what the focus is for the Wildcats the rest of the season. “I’m not saying this because I want you to feel sorry because Coach is saying it’s his fault. I don’t want that at all.
“I wholeheartedly believe in them and their potential and what they can be,” Abshear added. “So, I told them, ‘I just want you to play hard. Just play hard. When you’re playing hard, you’re playing for your family, the community that you’re representing, the school system here, and just buy into that.’
“These are life lessons. Everything that I tell them, I’m preaching it right back to myself. When you go through life, sometimes when things are not going your way at all — things are not really good — sometimes you’ve just got to say, ‘I’m just going to do the best anyway.’”
Monroe, which has won two of its last three, hosts Carlisle on Saturday.
