LCA’s Anna Reimink works around LPC’s Tori Miller Thursday night. (Photos by Mike Deak)

WINONA LAKE – It didn’t generate quite the excitement of their last meeting, but it held a good level of meaning.

Lakewood Park Christian and Lakeland Christian Academy renewed pleasantries for the first time since squaring off in an epic sectional championship game last season. Thursday night’s contest didn’t have nearly the drama, but provided some serious film studying opportunities in a 33-24 win by Lakewood.

LCA head coach Allison Kauffman folded in the now, and the potential for later, in assessing what her team produced against what could be a tourney rematch in February. While her ball club didn’t produce a quality offensive output against LPC, it did create several teaching moments.

“We’ve talked about a lot of the little things that we need to do down the stretch, in the fourth quarter,” Kauffman said. “Small things like protecting the ball in the triple threat position. Making solid passes to the corners, staying low on defense. We forgot about doing them, and they caught up to us. And when we got down in the fourth quarter and started pressing to catch up, we got even further away from some fundamentals.”

LCA’s Maddie Paris looks for a teammate.

LCA’s showing Thursday was a tale of two halves, where its defensive tenacity in a full court press gave LPC fits early on, but virtually disappeared in the second half. At 16-12 at halftime, LCA looked like it had LPC right where it wanted to be. That all changed in the second half, where the defensive pursuit subsided, and the game turned into a survival of the fittest on offense.

A 22-20 game heading into the fourth quarter saw the final eight minutes lay riddled in turnovers and indecision, particularly from the home side. What Kauffman has been trying to preach to her team saw moments where shots were passed up, passes were thrown into closed windows, and ultimately four turnovers and a myriad of missed free throws and shots left LCA falling short.

“We definitely weren’t consistent with our effort tonight,” Kauffman said. “There were times we were super aggressive and got to the ball quickly, and others where we stood around and watched them take it right to the basket. We played tired tonight. We didn’t put four full quarters together. Had we done that, I think we would have seen a different outcome.”

Chloe Jolloff and Taylor Gerke took over late for LPC. The two scored all but two of the Panthers’ 12 points in the final quarter, Jolloff finishing with a game-high 13 points. Gerke danced around playing with four fouls, but hit a key hoop to put LPC up six at 26-20 and wrapped up with five points.

LCA had a tough night shooting the ball, going 9-44 from the floor. Anna Reimink led the Cougars with eight points, but again was tentative in attempting shots as LPC often dared her to shoot in preference to crash her passing lanes. LCA committed 24 turnovers in the game, and while Tori Calizo pulled down a career-high 17 rebounds, the team’s leading scorer had just four points on 2-16 attempts.

“Lakewood did a good job collapsing on us inside when we did get the ball in there, and we didn’t do enough to get the ball back out to our shooters for those open shots,” Kauffman said. “We definitely needed to continue to look inside, especially off reversals, to keep Lakewood and future opponents honest in guarding inside and outside. That also will help us free up some offensive rebounding opportunities that we didn’t make tonight.”

LCA (2-2) will look to get back into the win column against another sectional opponent Saturday at Elkhart Christian.