Basketball coaches regularly talk about the merits of working inside-out, getting the interior game going to make things easier for the outside shooters.
The Camdenton Lady Lakers used that plan to perfection Monday night.
Camdenton got seven field goals in the first quarter of its game with Helias at Rackers Fieldhouse - all layups - to take a 14-9 lead. The Lady Lakers would hit a scorching 5-of-9 from 3-point range the rest of the game, all the while keeping up its inside attack, and claimed a 64-55 win.
Most of Camdenton's first-quarter layups came off a high-low set, with some perfectly placed lob passes leading to easy buckets.
"They got us on that lob a lot," Helias coach Sarah Eagan said. "We practiced on it, we went through it a lot. I think what got us confused was when they down-screened as well, so we didn't know whether to stay or switch or whatever. That put us down pretty quickly."
After falling in that hole, the Lady Crusaders quickly went down by double digits and didn't get it back down to single numbers until late in the fourth quarter.
Helias' comeback attempt in the second quarter was hampered by some ice-cold shooting, as the Lady Crusaders made just 2-of-13 from the field. They only got outscored 16-12, however, thanks to plenty of trips to the free-throw line. Helias made 8-of-14 from the charity stripe in the second period, after making 1-of-2 in the first, to go into halftime down 30-21.
"Our free throws hurt us," Eagan said. "We had missed seven by halftime and that would have put us down just two going into halftime. That killed us."
Camdenton took an 18-point lead three different times in the third quarter, the last at 49-31, but Helias got layups from Mai Nienhueser and Luci Francka to end the quarter to cut the deficit to 49-35.
The Lady Crusaders kept the pressure on to start the fourth quarter, with those two layups the start of a 20-5 run bridging the quarters. Helias got to within 57-51 when Morgan Wieberg dropped in a layup with 2:57 left, but that was as close as the Lady Crusaders would get.
Eagan said part of the problem early in the game stemmed from not taking advantage when Helias would break the Camdenton pressure.
"We have so many girls that can attack and we didn't," she said. "Especially in the first half, with them already in foul trouble, we needed to attack. Toward the end we did a better job of breaking the press and attacking, but there just wasn't enough time left."
Camdenton, which hit 8-of-11 free throws in the fourth quarter to salt away the victory, ended up with a 38-25 edge in rebounds.
"We saw on film that they crash the boards extremely hard," Eagan said. "Defensively, I've never seen a high-school team block out as well as they do. They find a body."
Nienhueser led Helias with 17 points, while Wieberg added 14 on 6-of-10 shooting.
"Morgan Wieberg played super-hard," Eagan said. "All our kids played super hard, shots just didn't fall."
Sophie Shore pumped in 21 points to lead Camdenton, while Bailey Rezabek added 20.
The game was the start of a busy week for Helias (6-4), which travels to Sedalia Smith-Cotton today before hosting Moberly on Friday.
In Monday's JV game, Camdenton got a layup with :07 left to post a 47-45 win.
Korie Otto had 16 points to lead Helias (2-4), while Maria Galbraith had 11.