BY CHARLES CHANEY
AUGUSTA, Kansas — A year ago, the Orioles were debuting some new players in the Bourm sisters and not many knew who they were. You fast forward a year, you now have coaches and assistants yelling out “shooter!” when either one of them touch the ball.
Not that matter too much.
Ella Bourm scored 15 and Emma scored nine as the Lady Orioles improved to 2-2 on the year heading into the Christmas break with the 40-30 win over Winfield.
“They’re not only fantastic basketball players, they’re fantastic leaders, too,” first-year Augusta head coach Krysten Crawford said. “They did a good job of containing their composure and looking for the other girls for scoring opportunities for them to step up. Super proud of my team tonight.”
The Lady Orioles are still figuring out how to win this season. Last year, they were really young and had to go through the gauntlet of their schedule and with a bit of an adjusted version, they’re still figuring things out but there is a light at the end of the tunnel.
“A lot of time it’s more about managing and working with the personalities than it is the Xs and Os,” Crawford said. “My main goal for this team was to have an improved and changed culture. It’s also included how to win together and you look at the Goddard game, we fought together an dcame back and even though we lost, it showed the girls they can compete in those big moments and they can compete with the bigger school teams.”
Emma is seeing the growth in her squad.
“We’ve been growing as a team with the coaches,” she said. “We’re figuring out what we can do together so we can be better as a team.”
She also credits Crawford.
“I trust her a lot,” Bourm said. “She helps me get better and like I can I feel like I can talk to her and she can help me learn and get grown as a player.”
Some of that growth was evident in the win over Winfield. When she wasn’t hitting big 3s for the Lady Orioles, she was dishing out to teammates and playing sound defense. She had nine first half points, including six in the third quarter when the Lady Orioles went on a run to take a 23-10 lead at the break.
They’re going to have ups and downs but Emma is relishing in her ‘senior’ year as a home schooled transfer. She only plays athletics with Augusta due to a new rule last season that allowed home school students to play for their respective districts. While some have denied all comers and made sure they were going to keep just their kids, it’s been nothing but welcoming the challenge at Augusta for the Bourm sisters.
“We’re having a lot of fun,” Emma said “It’s fun, but this was a lot more competitive that we get to see [playing for Augusta compared to home school competition, but yeah, it’s a lot more fun.”
Winfield came out of the second half on a tear, pulling the Vikings (0-4). They would get within five at 31-26 after a 9-2 run helped. However, Ella hit a 3-pointer early in the fourth to put the Lady Orioles back out in front comfortably. In turn, Augusta forced six fourth quarter turnovers and limited them to only five shots due to all of the turnovers. Augusta made four shots in the fourth.
In all, the Augusta defense held Winfield to 36.7 percent shooting in the game, including the 25 percent in the first half. They also had nine steals and forced 22 Winfield turnovers.
Crawford’s first year as head coach has started to go the way she wanted. The rule-10 coach is finishing her bachelor’s at Wichita State but is excited for what the future holds for her girls.
“They have so much potential,” Crawford said. “They haven’t been pushed to get there and that’s something I told them at teh beginning is sky is the limit. They’re a good basketball team and I’m going to push and push because they have it in them. It’s a disservice to them if I’m not pushing them to get it out of them.
“They’re slowly starting to see hey, I do have more to offer’ and we can go the distance as a team.”
For the Lady Orioles, five of the six girls who entered the box score in some capacity scored four or more points.
“We’re not very deep, so that means we have to be disciplined on defense and commit those costly mistakes,” Crawford said. “We’re a smart team and we’re capable of doing the right thing on the court.”
Augusta now will turn their attention to the break and to McPherson, their first real 4A test. They know they were better than their outcome at Mulvane and Goddard. The always tough Lady Bullpups await right out of the break.
“We’re getting into the gym and we’re going to try to work on a few tings,” Crawford said. “Improve every day is what we’re aiming for.”
AUGUSTA 40, WINFIELD 30
Winfield 2 8 16 4 – 30
Augusta 8 15 8 9 – 40
WINFIELD (0-4) 30:
Griffin 1 0-0 – 2; Flaton 1 1-2 – 3; Hutto 1 0-0 – 2; Jones 3 1-4 – 7; Harris 1 1-2 – 3; Seitzinger 2 0-0 – 4; Meeker 0 (2) 3-4 – 9. TOTALS: 9-23 2-7 6-12 – 30.
AUGUSTA (2-2) 40:
Ratcliff 3 0-2 – 6; Ella Bourm 1 (4) 1-1 – 15; Lichlyter 3 0-0 – 6; Pfeifer 2 0-0 – 4; Fleming 0 0-2 – 0; Emma Bourm 0 (3) 0-0 – 9. TOTALS: 9-26 7-16 1-5 – 40.
