The Van Wert County Courthouse

Friday, Mar. 29, 2024

Coaches Corner: VW’s Phlipot and Laudick

SCOTT TRUXELL/independent sports editor

This week’s Coaches Corner features Van Wert girls basketball coach Hannah Phlipot and Van Wert boys basketball coach Ben Laudick. Both coaches have enjoyed improved play by their respective teams down the home stretch of the regular season.

Hannah Phlipot

The Lady Cougars (6-15, 4-4 WBL) will finish the regular season at home Thursday night against Bath, then will open the Division II sectionals against Shawnee at Paulding on Tuesday, February 18.

Van Wert is 2-3 over the last five games, with wins over Kenton and Elida. The losses have come to a pair of 15-5 teams, Fairview and Bryan, and Lima Central Catholic (11-9). The Lady Cougars hung with Fairview and Bryan and led Lima Central Catholic by nine entering the fourth quarter.

Hannah Phlipot

While coming up short in those games, head coach Hannah Phlipot is encouraged by what she’s seen and she believes the Lady Cougars are playing true team ball late in the season.

“Recently we have been playing extremely unselfish basketball – the girls are making the extra pass, pushing the tempo of the game and getting open looks at the basket,” Phlipot explained. “The last two games we have achieved new season highs in team assists. This is a stat column we have put great emphasis on in practice and as we prepare for our opponents.”

The Lady Cougars have played good defense throughout the season, but improvement has been noticeable on the other side of the ball as well.

“Defense has always been a strength of ours,” Phlipot said. “We are very athletic and have been able to hold teams to low scoring games. Throughout the course of the season, our offense has improved tremendously and our shooting and free throw percentage have increased greatly.”

Junior Jaylyn Rickard is the team’s leading scorer, averaging seven points per game, followed by two freshmen – Kyra Welch (6.2 ppg) and Sofi Houg (6.1 ppg).

“We have started Kyra and Sofi for the majority of the games this season,” Phlipot said. “These two have fulfilled very vital roles for us. Kyra leads our team in total season assists and Sofi is our third leading scorer. Additionally, the girls have played in some very tight games and these experiences are going to really help them in the coming years.”

Senior Jamison Clouse averages 5.5 points per game and is the team leader in rebounds (6.4 per game).

Van Wert will face a tough opponent in Bath (17-2, 7-1 WBL) on Thursday, then Shawnee (18-2) in the sectionals next Tuesday.

“It is extremely important for us to approach each game with confidence. We have seen glimpses of great, unselfish basketball from this group of girls,” Phlipot said. “The key to our success is being consistent. If we can sustain intense defensiveness pressure, limit our turnovers, and play unselfish offense for four quarters, I strongly believe we can compete with anybody.”

Ben Laudick

Saturday’s 66-49 win over St. Henry marked the third win in four games for Van Wert (6-13, 2-5 WBL), which is encouraging at this stage of the season.

“At this time of the year we are starting to play our best basketball in my opinion and that obviously makes me pretty happy but more importantly than that our guys are having a great time being around each other,” head coach Ben Laudick said.

Ben Laudick

“Defensively we are getting timely stops when we need them and overall we are rebounding well at both ends of the floor, the coach continued. “Our offensive execution is getting better and our guys are shooting with confidence.”

“Owen (Treece) is obviously capable of having big nights but the play of Jake Hilleary (double figures both games last weekend), Keaton Brown, and Clayton Proffitt are helping us at the offensive end. They are knocking down shots, which is allowing us to do more things offensively.”

Van Wert picked up the No. 7 seed at the 11-team Division II Ada district and the Cougars will play No. 9 seed Wapakoneta in the sectional semifinals at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, February 26, at Paulding High School.

“If you would have asked me last week at this time I wouldn’t be to sure about how our tournament draw would go but with how we finished the weekend out on the court we are happy with our seed and how the draw went as well,” Laudick explained. “We had a scenario or two where we thought we might play Wapak so that did not come as a surprise but a few teams seeded higher than us did some things differently than we thought but we can’t control that. We talked about the tournament draw as a team Monday at practice very briefly but then quickly shifted our attention to Bath.”

The Wildcats are just 2-17 (0-7 WBL) this season, but Laudick believes that record is a deceiving one.

“Bath is overall a very young team playing a lot of sophomores and their record may not look all that great on paper but they are in a lot of close games,” Laudick stated. “They have lost six or seven games by six points or less and they will present some challenges out on the floor.”

“They like to get out and run and they have quite a few guys that shoot it well from the perimeter. Rebounding well at both ends will be a focal point for us heading into Friday’s game and we look forward to trip down to Bath to try to keep our winning ways going.”

After Friday night, Van Wert’s next game will be Tuesday, February 18 at Lima Central Catholic.

POSTED: 02/12/20 at 4:57 am. FILED UNDER: Sports