Central-Southeastern’s defense swallows up Clopton, sets stage for run at Christmas tourney title

QUINCY — Physical defense wins games.

“It does in our opinion,” Central-Southeastern girls basketball coach Matt Long said.

And you can’t ease into that.

“It’s even more important to do it out of the gate and get them down early,” Panthers guard Karly Peters said.

It’s precisely what the Panthers did Thursday in overwhelming previously undefeated Clopton. Central-Southeastern led by 26 points at halftime and held the Hawks more than 30 points below their season scoring average in a 64-31 victory in the 17th Rumble on the River at John Wood Community College’s Student Activity Center.

“I thought our energy level was as good as it has ever been this season to start a game,” Long said. “I thought when we got a comfortable lead they kept the motors running where as in the past we’ve had some tendency to take the foot off the gas and let teams whittle away at it.”

The sting of losing to Byron lit that spark.

“We knew we had to bounce back,” Peters said. “That was a big thing.”

Panthers forward Lauren Miller, who was named MVP, scored a game-high 21 points, while Kayli Bockhold added 13 points and Peters had 12.

CSE (10-2) faces Monmouth-Roseville on Saturday in Augusta, Ill., before heading to the State Farm Holiday Classic in Bloomington-Normal next week as the defending champion in the small school girls bracket.

“They’re big, they’re physical and they have a really good point guard,” Long said of Monmouth-Roseville. “They’re going to test us. It’s going to prepare us going into Bloomington where about every team you see over there has a big post player.”

The schedule may be challenging, but the Panthers have come to embrace it.

“(Long) put the schedule in front of us for a reason, to get us ready for the postseason,” Peters said. “It ‘s going to take these big games to get us where we want to go.”