Hope Fancil pulls up for two while Caston’s Brianna Hubenthal scrambles to defend during a game at Lakeland Christian Academy Thursday night. (Photos by James Costello)

WINONA LAKE — With senior Hope Fancil shouldering a lot of Lakeland Christian Academy’s offensive load and junior Tori Calizo following close behind, the Cougars have seen a lot of junk defenses over the past couple years.

Caston tried just such a hybrid defense against its hosts in Thursday night’s game, but LCA was ready. Three players scored in double figures led by Fancil’s game-high 25 points, and seven total Cougars made the scoring column en route to the team’s highest points production of the year in a 66-43 home win in Winona Lake.

“Caston tried to come out in a box and one, triangle and two-type thing, and we had other girls step up and that’s how you beat that type of defense is you have other girls ready to shoot the ball and put it in the hole,” said LCA head coach Allison Kaufman.

“They threw something like that at us last year, and other teams have done it this year. The stats are out there, and teams come and scout us and they know who the majority of the scoring comes from. But we proved tonight that it’s not just those two.”

Jess Slone battles inside with Jordan Clingler (35) and Ashlynn Kline.

While Fancil filled up the stat sheet with her game-high scoring, six rebounds, five steals, five blocks and an assist, junior back court mate Anna Reimink added 11 points, six steals and two assists. Senior forward Jess Slone did a yeoman’s job on the inside, meanwhile, registering a double-double of 12 points and 12 rebounds battling against a Caston front court that featured two six-footers in Jordan Clingler and Ally Wiese.

“She’s really led us this year in rebounding and offensively on the inside. She was really, really strong for us on both ends, rebounding offensively and putbacks but also cleaning up the glass on the defensive end,” said Kaufman of Slone.

But the production didn’t end with the Cougars’ three double-digit scorers, either.

A total of seven players came to the party for LCA (11-8). Calizo was limited to five points to go with six rebounds and three steals, while senior Brady Gross added six points, six rebounds and four blocks, and Abigail Fishel and Maddie Paris tossed in four and three points, respectively, off the bench, the latter also passing out four assists in a deep and balanced offensive effort by the home team.

“We have Jess and Brady and Anna stepping up, and Abby and Maddy did a great job coming off the bench ready to shoot. That’s what we need: We need everybody with confidence because everybody is a threat out there,” Kaufman said.

Much of the Cougars’ production came at the foul line Thursday.

LCA players converted 22 of 31 free throw attempts in a game that featured a combined 45 fouls and 54 free throws by the combatants. Although several were in intermittent foul trouble, none of the Cougars lineup fouled out at the game, while three Caston players were saddled with five fouls in the Comets’ fourth straight loss.

Abigail Fishel handles the ball on the wing while Ashlynn Kline moves to defend.

“I love that the girls are attacking and being strong and getting to the free throw line, which we haven’t seen a lot of this year so seeing it tonight was really encouraging. And then seeing more than half of them go in was also a big help to us to get the win tonight,” said Kaufman. “We haven’t been shooting more than 50 percent on the year so coming out and hitting over 50 percent of our free throws tonight with getting to the line over 30 times tonight was really helpful to us, and I was really happy with that.”

Brianna Hubenthal finished with a team-high 16 points for Caston (6-14), while Ashlynn Kline netted 13. Jordan Clingler scored 11 points with a whopping 19 rebounds but was held to just two points after the break, part of a clean-up effort on the inside that saw LCA out-rebound the Comets 27-21 in the second half after losing the battle of the boards 21-15 over the first two frames.

“Basically all of that was the focus and the heart of my girls to box out and reminding them in the first but then again at halftime, all of their points in that first half were in the paint. Our defense is what fuels us so when we are lacking on that it really changes the game,” Kaufman explained. “So getting my girls back to the place of where they should’ve been in that first half tonight to allow any of those offensive rebounds to happen, I was really disappointed in our first half effort as far as the offensive boards and then they did step it up in the second half and did a lot better on that.”

Thursday’s win followed a 45-30 victory at Granger Christian on Tuesday. Those two wins represent the Cougars’ first back-to-back since the Cougar Classic on Dec. 28. With just four more games to go before starting Sectional 52 play, Kaufman likes the direction her team is headed.

“The last two weeks we packed it in with six games, two of those being make-ups so we do have a lot of chances the last two weeks to continue to get better and grow. But as a coach I’m looking at the positives of where we were at the beginning of season, to closing out games,” she said. “I always nitpick, too. That game I was disappointed with some of the things that we’ve been working on all season, and you’re still seeing the box-outs and the turnovers because we were sped up a little bit. But overall from the beginning of the season I’m happy with how the girls have improved and where we’re going to put ourselves in a position going into sectionals.”

Jesse Calizo drives during LCA’s junior high basketball game Thursday night. (Photo provided)

LCA’s junior varsity fell 26-15 to its Caston counterparts. Avery Hobbs led the JV Cougars with five points. Madison Smith scored eight to lead a balanced attack by the Comets.

Caston resumes play at Winamac Saturday. Lakeland plays an afternoon game at Trinity Saturday with tip-off scheduled for 12:30 p.m.

Also Thursday, the LCA Junior High girls missed a last second shot against Caston to fall by a narrow 28-26 margin. They dropped to an even 3-3 with the result.