Lady Eagles take third place in annual Mid-Del Holiday Invitational, after defeating the Northwest Classen Lady Knights 67-53. Alaisha Castleberry, pictured right of center holding trophy, was named to the All-Tournament team.
by Derek Lewis
The Del City Lady Eagles (1-4) had a strong tournament showing during the weekend with great guard play from seniors Piper Kalthoff and Alaisha Castleberry. The Lady Eagles sandwiched two dominant victories against the Oklahoma City Storm and Northwest Classen Lady Knights in between a loss to 6A Broken Arrow on their way to a third place finish.
Their weekend started with Del City wasting no time jumping all over the Storm. They leaped to a 22-6 led by a combined 15 first quarter points from Kalthoff and Castleberry. The second quarter saw more of the same as Castleberry dropped six more points leading the Lady Eagles to a 39-14 halftime score.
The Lady Eagles defense was particularly stifling turning the Storm over 13 times in the first half while only turning the ball over 5 times themselves. Castleberry had 16 points at the half going 3-4 from 3-point land.
The Storm didn’t exactly go quietly. They started the second half on a 16-3 run scoring 12 straight points at one point led by guard Topazia Hawkins who dropped 11 points. The turnover tide shifted in the third as the Lady Eagles turned the ball over 10 times. By the end of the third quarter, Del Cities lead had been cut to 46-36.
Del City quickly shut the door in the fourth quarter boosting the lead back up to 16. The game was never in danger again with the Lady Eagles getting the win 64-44. Castleberry scored 22 points, 2 rebounds and 3 steals with her back court mate Kalthoff doing a bit of everything with 13 points, 5 rebounds, 3 assists, 2 steals and a block.
“They just have the green light,” said Del City Head Coach Karri Sears of her two senior guards, “They have control of the team. They’re my floor generals.”
The Lady Eagles saw themselves on the other end of a hot start the next night against the Broken Arrow Lady Tigers. Broken Arrow forced Del City into 2-7 shooting and 5 turnovers and jumped out to a 20-6 lead. Lady Tigers’ guard Ashlyn McBride led the way with 10 points in the first.
The Lady Eagles were able to fix the turnover problem in the second quarter, but still weren’t able to find their range finishing the half 10-28 from the field. They cut the Tigers lead down to 11 at halftime.
However, Broken Arrow unveiled a zone full court press in the second half that Del City never solved. Del City turned the ball over three times immediately as the Lady Tigers extended their lead back to 16 points. The Lady Tigers were aggressive on the offensive end, as well as getting multiple Lady Eagles in foul trouble and going 6-9 from the line in the third quarter.
The Lady Eagles never got back on track falling to the Lady Tigers 75-53. Castleberry survived a poor shooting night going 4-18 to score 21 points with 3 rebounds. Kalthoff added 15 points, 2 rebounds and an assist. Toree Thompson led the Lady Tigers with 20 points, 5 rebounds and 3 steals.
The Lady Eagles never found a rhythm offensively going 17-45 from the field with 18 turnovers.
“We had some great looks and could just not get any of them to fall,” said Coach Sears of the poor shooting performance against Broken Arrow.
Still, the Lady Eagles had a shot to take third place on the final day if they could rebound from the previous night’s effort.
The shooting slump didn’t follow them into the third place game against the Northwest Classen Lady Knights. Kalthoff got off to a hot start with 20 points in the first half on 4-5 shooting from behind the arc. The Lady Eagles also forced 16 turnovers coming up with 13 steals to nail down a 45-23 lead at halftime.
The defense didn’t let up forcing 7 more turnovers in the third quarter to extend the lead to 62-29. Coach Sears pulled her starters and started experimenting in the fourth leading to a run by the Lady Knights, but Del City was never in danger winning 67-53.
“We had struggled in the third quarters of the first two games,” said Sears of the complete effort in the third place game. “So, we just really wanted to focus on winning each quarter and not lose our edge.”
Kalthoff led the way with 25 points, 5 steals, 4 rebounds and 2 assists. Castleberry threw in 18 points of her own with 5 assists, 4 steals and 2 rebounds. Sophomore forward Breail Goodlow, who was coming back from injury, was finally able to catch a bit of a stride knocking down two 3-pointers to score 8 points with 5 rebounds.
The win secured the Lady Eagles third place victory with Castleberry taking home an All-Tournament selection. Kalthoff also had an outstanding tournament for Del City.
“I hate that only one of them is going to get the All-Tournament team because that’s a hard thing to do,” Sears said.
