CHS Freshman Lady Jackets host A.J. and Sesser
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[The CHS Freshman Lady Jackets Basketball Team competed in a two-quarter basketball game against Ziegler-Royalton-Christopher December 6. The quarters were only five minutes long and the clock ran continuously. Chester lost a close one, 24-21. Since that time the freshman have been dormant.
Scheduling has been a serious problem once again this year at the freshman girl's level with fewer and fewer teams manning a freshman team due to low numbers of players. The issue is especially true with smaller teams such as those in the Black Diamond Conference.
The problem also existed in the River-to-River Conference with more than half of the teams in recent years. Budgetary issues further compound the situation at some schools. The bottom line; there are fewer and fewer teams around to play freshman basketball at the girl's level.
The Chester Freshman Lady Yellow Jackets have been practicing, however, for the past two months and they dress for the JV squad. Most have seen playing time at the JV level, but playing time is sparse due to high numbers on the JV squad.
The freshmen scrimmage daily with the Varsity and JV Teams, but they have not had much time alone as a unit to bond or develop against players of their own skill and experience levels.
In some respects they are getting good experience going up against JV and Varsity players on a daily basis, but it has been frustrating and sometimes boring for the freshmen not having had a game since December 6.
CHS Athletic Director, Mike Coffey, has worked hard to find games for the freshmen and Freshman Coach, pat Knowles, is thankful that Coffey has had some success getting a few teams to agree to play a freshman game prior to JV and varsity games.
Many teams, however, that do not have sufficient players at the upper levels are reluctant to wear their freshmen players out in a freshman game prior to JV and varsity games because they need them to be fresh for those games that count toward an end-of-the year record. Thus, the two-quarter, five-minute, continuous clock events.
After almost two-months of practicing and waiting, the CHS freshman Girl's squad had an opportunity to compete Saturday morning January 22 at 10:00 a.m. The Jackets hosted Anna-Jonesboro.
A.J somehow has managed to schedule an 18-game schedule, most of which has already been played. Therefore the Lady Freshman Wildcats have seen much more competition and have much more experience, not to mention that each Wildcat is approximately six inches taller than our Lady Jacket counterparts.
The Lady Jackets didn't seem to mind, however. They were just happy to have a game in which they could implement their skills and compete against other freshman players.
The game against A.J. was a real, four-quarter contest with six-minute quarters. A.J. opened the game with a 19-9 first quarter. The taller girls and butterflies worked on the freshmen, but they played very hard and demonstrated that the previous weeks of practice had paid off.
In the opening period, Averi Mueller scored five points on two field goals and a free throw while Sarah Bindel and Kaley Ludwig also connected for two points apiece. The second quarter was somewhat better with the CHS defense Chester holding A.J. to two fewer points at 17.
The Jacket's offense scored ten points as Averi Mueller scored four points on two field goals, Sarah Bindel scored four more points on a pair of field goals and Natasha Pulliam added two more points on a field goal. A.J. led 36-19 at the half.
After the break Maribeth Lawrence came alive and added four points on a pair of field goals. Ludwig scored again for two points as did Pulliam. Bindel connected for a free throw as did Mueller. At the end of the third quarter the Lady Jackets had increased their score by ten more points, but A.J. added 13 more to increase their lead to 49-29.
The Lady Wildcats outscored the Lady Jackets, 16-7 down the stretch, but CHS continued to play hard and never gave up. In the quarter Alexandria Fedderke connected on a field goal as did Katie Roth. Maribeth Lawrence made things very exciting as she knocked down a three-pointer at the buzzer. In spite of the 65-36 loss, that three-pointer gave the game an uplifting end.
For the game Averi Mueller paced the Jackets offensively with 10 points. Maribeth Lawrence and Sarah Bindel each scored seven points apiece. Natasha Pulliam and Kaley Ludwig added four points apiece while Alexandria Fedderke and Katie Roth each scored two points apiece. All but one Lady Jacket scored in the loss.
As a team the Jackets shot 16-of-36 from the field or 44 percent. From the free throw line they shot 43 percent or made 3-of-7. The rebounding game was a deadlock with A.J. grabbing 33 boards and Chester grabbed 32 rebounds.
The Jackets committed 33 turnovers and had 20 bad passes which did not help their situation. They did record 38 hard play marks which demonstrated that they worked very hard and never gave up.
Maribeth Lawrence led the team in hard play with nine marks followed by Katie Roth (5), Natasha Pulliam (5), Alexandria Fedderke (5) Maddie Conner (5), Averi Mueller (3), Sarah Bindel (3) and Kaley Ludwig (2).
Averi Mueller and Sarah Bindel led the team in rebounding with seven boards apiece. Maddie Conner grabbed five rebounds and played very good defense. Maribeth Lawrence led the team in assists with seven followed by Katie Roth who dished out three assists.
With the loss the Freshman Lady Yellow Jackets fell to 0-2 overall and 0-1 in the Black Diamond Conference.
Later that same day the freshmen had another opportunity to compete against another freshman team. Sesser-Valier came to town to play a three-game series with the Yellow Jackets beginning at 5:45 p.m. with a freshman game. The contest was only two halves with a continuous, 10-minute clock.
Both halves were very close, competitive and exciting. Sesser-Valier has a total roster of only 13 players for all three levels of competition, freshman, JV and varsity. Their roster consists of six freshmen, six sophomores and only one junior. They have no seniors this year. Thus, the Sesser coaches opted to play only a short game to save their freshmen players for the JV and varsity contests.
The first period was close and competitive with the Jackets trailing by only one point, 8-7, at the end of the first 10-minute period. During that opening stretch, Kaley Ludwig knocked down a three pointer and a field goal for five of Chester's points.
Alexandria Fedderke added two points on a field goal rounding out Chester's eight points. Maty Garner scored six-of- Sesser's eight points on two field goals and she also knocked down a pair of free throws. Bailee Jones added two points rounding out Sesser-Valier's eight points.
After a brief three-minute break the freshmen hit the floor running once again for the second period. Sesser outscored CHS, 12-7 for a final score of, 20-14, but once again the game was exciting and hard-fought.
In the second half the Lady Jackets got even scoring from four players with Kaley Ludwig, Sarah Bindel, Alexandria Fedderke and Natasha Pulliam each connecting for field goals. Averi Mueller made a free throw rounding out Chester's seven points.
Sesser got pints from four players also with Bailee Jones and Maty garner each scoring four points apiece and Claire Pytlinski and Kayla Kulinski each scoring two points apiece.
For the game Chester was led offensively by Kaley Ludwig who scored seven points followed by Sarah Bindel, Alexandria Fedderke and Natasha Pulliam with two points apiece. Averi Mueller rounded out the offense with one point.
Sesser-Valier was paced by Maty Garner with 10 points followed by Bailee Jones (6), Claire Pytlinski (2) and Kayla Kulinski (2).
Alexandria Fedderke led the Jackets in rebounding with five boards. Natasha Pulliam, Averi Mueller, Sarah Bindel and Maribeth Lawrence each recorded an assist apiece. Sarah Bindel recorded two steals and Katie Roth had one steal. Roth also recovered a loose ball. Bindel led the team in hard play marks wit nine marks. As a team the freshmen had 17 hard play marks for the game.
With the loss the Freshman Lady Yellow Jackets Basketball Team fell to 0-3 for the season and 0-2 in the conference.
The freshmen have several games scheduled for the last two weeks of the season including Monday January 24 against A.J. at Colbert Gym (5:00 p.m.); Tuesday January 25 against Red Bud at Colbert Gym (6:15 p.m.); Wednesday January 26 at Red Bud (6:00 p.m.); Saturday January 29 at Columbia (10:00 a.m.) and Saturday February 5 at Colbert Gym (9:00 a.m.).