WILLARD — The Buckeye Central Buckettes have a beautiful gymnasium in New Washington where they play their home games.
The Buckettes have made Robert L. Haas Gymnasium their home away from home when tournament time rolls around.
Buckeye Central blew out to a 21-point first-quarter lead, then coasted to a 52-21 victory over Northern 10 Athletic Conference rival Seneca East in the Division IV district championship at Willard High School.
The win marked the sixth straight district championship for Buckeye Central. The significance was not lost on senior Claudia Pifher, who has been a part of the past four.
“It means a lot, especially in front of the community and fans,” Pifher said. “It means a lot to me — a district championship in this atmosphere — there’s nothing like it.”
Pifher scored a game-high 21 points and in the process, broke two BC scoring records. She passed the girls’ record of 1546 set by Jenna Karl and later eclipsed the boys’ record of 1553 set by Dan Thallman at Bloomville. Pifher now sits at 1561 heading to the regional tournament.
“This history wouldn’t be possible if it wasn’t for the ones before us,” Pifher said. “Coming into this year, we wanted to win it for them.”
The game was decided early. The Buckettes hit nine of 11 shots from the field, including six 3-point shots, in rolling to a 24-3 lead by the end of the first quarter.
“I told the girls it was coming, and we just didn’t have a very good night defensively or offensively,” Seneca East coach Don Vogt said of the first-period onslaught. “A lot of that is to (Buckeye Central’s) credit. They put a lot of pressure on our guards, and we just didn’t handle it very well.”
The shooting display didn’t surprise Buckettes’ coach Abram Kaple, but that was not necessarily the emphasis while game planning.
“We have good shooters. We did a lot of shooting in practice this week,” Kaple said. “Our kids came out with a lot of confidence, which kind of rolled over from Thursday.”
Kaple’s reference was to the Buckettes’ 69-16 rout of Mansfield Christian in the district semifinal.
“We understand what this game means, with the district title on the line and we came out and shot it confidently,” Kaple said. “Our mentality coming into this game was we wanted to be sound on the defensive end. Our job was, maybe we don’t make shots tonight, but we can come out and control our effort and our intensity.”
That defensive intensity held the Tigers to one of seven from the field in the first quarter and two of 20 through two periods, by which time Buckeye Central (24-1) had built a 38-7 advantage.
Seneca East (20-5) had a significant size advantage in the post but could not take advantage of it.
“They pushed us away from the basket and created a lot of difficulty,” Vogt said. “(Our posts) struggled early on. Maybe it was the tone that was set. I don’t know.”
Brooke Bordner and Kiersten Cook led the Tigers with six points each. Cook grabbed 13 rebounds.
“It’s difficult, no matter who it is, no matter what division, to come out here and win this game,” Kaple said of the six-peat. For (Pifher and Julia Evak) to do it four years in a row and us as a program six years in a row — they’re great kids who buy in to what we’re doing. They listen, they’re super coachable.”
Emily Siesel seconded Pifher with 16 points and Sydney Wurm added nine, with three 3s. Pifher had five rebounds.
“We didn’t play the game we wanted to play but a lot of that was to their credit,” Vogt said of the Bucks’ defense. “They came out very aggressive defensively, hot offensively. That was it.”
“We’re capable of scoring a lot of points, especially when Kate (Siesel) and Syd (Wurm) kind of get going,” Kaple said. “Those are kind of the X-factor for us.”
Vogt says good-bye to five seniors — Bordner, Cook, Mya Ousley, Makenna Depinet, and Amelia Boes.
“I’m proud of the girls,” Vogt said. “They had 20 wins. That’s only the fourth time in school history that’s been done. We got to the district finals.”
Buckeye Central moves on to the regional tournament at Massillon Perry High School Thursday at 6 p.m. where they will face New Middletown Springfield.
“This is a goal. To some point, it’s becoming and expectation,” Kaple said. “That’s tough to deal with. It’s hard to deal with because everybody’s gunning for you.”
The coach attributes the continued success to the hard work the girls put in in the off-season.
“We say that nets are cut in March,” Kaple said. “But they’re won in June and July.”
Box score
Buckeye Central 24 16 5 7 — 52
Seneca East 3 4 6 8 — 21
Buckeye Central (24-1): Shots 20-40; 3-pt. shots 10-15 (Claudia Pifher 5, Sydney Wurm 3, Emily Siesel 2); Free throws 2-5; Rebounds 19 (Claudia Pifher 5); Turnovers 8. Scoring: Emily Siesel 6 2 16, Claudia Pifher 8 0 21, Julia Evak 1 0 2, Kennedy Deppen 2 0 4, Sydney Wurm 3 0 9.
Seneca East (20-5): Shots 6-31; 3-pt. shots 3-13 (Brooke Bordner, Kiersten Cook, Caroline Kagy); Free throws 6-12; Rebounds 27 (Kiersten Cook 13); Turnovers 18. Scoring: Brooke Bordner 2 1 6, Makenna Depinet 0 1 1, Kiersten Cook 2 1 6, Amelia Boes 1 3 5, Caroline Kagy 1 0 3.