Newaygo girls take care of Fremont 68-32

By Craig Beilfuss
LocalSportsJournal.com

FREMONT—The Fremont girls scored the first bucket of the game on Friday evening against the Newaygo Lions, then saw the Lions go on a 17-0 first quarter run, which would ultimately lead to a 23-6 lead for Newaygo after the first eight minutes of play en route to a 68-32 win.

Newaygo senior Jaxi Long sparked the early first quarter run with 12 points in the opening quarter. Long would finish with a game high 17 points, 4 rebounds and 4 steals on the evening.

The Lions added to their first half lead by outscoring Fremont 17-11 in the second stanza to take a commanding 40-17 halftime lead and never looked back.

Newaygo would have scoring advantages in the third quarter 14-7 and in the final eight minutes of 14-8 over the host Packers.

Joining Long in double digits were senior Emmerson Goodin and sophomore Isabella Welch with 16 points each.

“Really good game for the girls tonight,” said Newaygo head coach Nate Thomasma. “Fremont always plays hard and is well coached so it is nice to be able to get a win there. Girls shot the ball well. I thought we played with some intensity defensively tonight as a team. Bella Welch came off the bench and had some big buckets in the second quarter that gave us a good spark,” said Thomasma.

The Packers were led by freshmen Khailia Noordyk who tossed in 9 points and grabbed 12 rebounds.

“We got overwhelmed early by a good basketball team tonight, said Fremont head coach Wes Zerlaut. “We did not handle their full court pressure well and it turned into a lot of points for them. They were aggressive and quick, and we did not take care of the ball as well as we needed to.”

Newaygo improves to 7-1 overall and 3-0 in the CSAA Gold and will host Howard City Tri-County on Tuesday. Fremont drops to 1-6 overall and 1-2 in the CSAA Gold. They will host the Grant Tigers on Tuesday evening.