Dan River slows down Stotmeister, advances to Dogwood girls semifinals

The simple realization for Dan River coach Deauti Harris at halftime against Nelson County was finding a way to slow down the Governors’ star forward Emily Stotmeister.

Harris played to the Wildcats’ strength and used a suffocating full-court press that wore down the Governors in the second half. Dan River also got contributions from its strong supporting cast in the final 16 minutes for a 60-52 victory Saturday afternoon in the quarterfinals of the Dogwood District tournament.

Dan River (14-7), the No. 3 seed for the tournament, plays at No. 2 Altavista at 6 p.m. Tuesday. The Wildcats and the Colonels split their regular-season series, each winning on their home floor.

“We recognize that she is one of the best players in our district and she probably is the best player in our district,” Harris said of Stotmeister. “We recognized that she was weak with her ball handling skills, so we kind of wanted to put pressure on them outside to deny her the ball and force her in a bad spot to keep her from scoring. To stop her was really the deciding factor of the game.”

Stotmeister scored 19 of her game-high 31 points in the first half and carried the Governors (5-16) to a 29-21 halftime lead. She also added a game-high 15 rebounds.

However, the added focus on containing Stotmeister in the second half slowly paid off as Dan River took its first lead of the second half on a Raven Richardson (14 points) layup, 40-39, early in the fourth quarter.

The teams exchanged baskets and Stotmesiter tied the score at 42-42 off her seventh offensive rebound putback of the game at the 4:58 mark of the fourth quarter.

Dan River then scored eight straight points in the span of 23 seconds, highlighted by Brittney Venable’s four-point play with 4:23 left that gave the Wildcats a 50-42 lead that was never relinquished.

“Dan River, they did a good job of closing the gaps and boxing out and taking away our fast breaks when they pressed us,” Stotmeister said. “That’s what really hurt us — turnovers.

“I think it really turned around when we came out for the second half,” she added. “They started making shots and we started turning the ball over again.”

N’Taesha Davis scored a team-high 17 points for Dan River — 10 coming in the second half, including eight in the third quarter as the Wildcats cut dramatically into a Nelson County 10-point lead (37-27 with 3:57 left in third).

Venable added 13 points.

Aja Vest-Turner scored eight points for Nelson County and Kayla Dooms finished with seven points.

“She’s been our rock all season long,” Nelson County coach Debbie Whitmore said of Stotmeister. “She’s our go-to person and everybody knows it.”