ST. LEON — The more Thursday night’s girls basketball game wore on, the more Columbus East realized how much it missed Whitley Rankin.
The senior guard missed her second consecutive game with strep throat. After giving up 69 points in a win against Brown County on Tuesday, East Central eclipsed that in sending the Olympians to their first loss of the season, a 70-55 decision.
“We found out these two games, even though we beat brown County, that missing Whitley Rankin is big offensively and defensively,” East coach Danny Brown said. “She’s a four-year starter, and we miss her big time. Whit does so much for us. They wouldn’t get those drives to the basket with her out front. Her and Koryn (Greiwe) work really well together out front. We just don’t have that same cohesiveness right now, but we’ll get there.”
Greiwe, who scored a career-high 44 points on Tuesday and came in averaging 32 a game, finished with 28 on Thursday. Katie Dougherty scored 14 points, and Gabby Dean added five points and a game-high 10 rebounds.
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The Trojans (4-1) led from start to finish. They jumped out to a 10-4 lead after one quarter and led 28-21 at halftime.
The Olympians (4-1) came back to within 31-28 midway through the third quarter and had a shot to cut the lead to one. But it didn’t fall, and East Central went on a 9-2 run to take their biggest lead at 40-30. The Trojans led 44-34 after three quarters.
The Trojans then opened the fourth period with a 9-1 run to take a 53-35 lead, and the Olympians would come no closer than 13 the rest of the way.
Kyla Maxwell scored 19 points to lead four East Central players in double figures. Josie Trabel scored 15, while Hope Fox added 14 and Brilan McCory had 11.
“We didn’t guard anybody,” Brown said. “All they did the whole night was drive to the basket and shoot layups. We let them shoot layups.”
The Olympians were making their first trip to East Central since winning the sectional in 2018. That year, they beat the Trojans in overtime in the sectional final.
This year’s sectional will be at Bloomington South.
“These kids want to learn, and they want to get better,” Brown said. “We’re going to get better, but we have a long way to go. East Central will be a whole different game if we see them in the sectional. Hopefully, we’ll be full strength by then.”
