By James Costello Sports Editor
LAKEVILLE — The Lady Lancers keep finding ways to win.
After trailing throughout its last game against Northern Lakes Conference opponent John Glenn, LaVille rallied back from a 27-20 halftime deficit to beat the Falcons in a 49-48 overtime thriller for the team’s first home win over Glenn in nearly five years. The Lancers staged another dramatic comeback Tuesday in their first game back from a 10-day layover, outscoring visiting Culver Community by a lopsided 22-9 fourth-quarter margin, taking their first lead of the game on a putback from sophomore reserve Shelby Low with under three minutes on the clock and capping off the night with a decisive 8-2 run for a 46-39 victory over the Cavaliers in a Winning Edge Girls Basketball Holiday Tournament semifinal on their home turf at Dale E. Cox Gymnasium.
“That was a tough battle,” said LaVille head coach Kevin McCullough. “It’s a big rivalry for both teams. This will be the second time in three years that we will play three times. We know each other; there’s no secrets going on out there, it’s just get out there and play some basketball. We haven’t played anybody that plays any harder than they do. Our kids, to their credit, behind the whole game, behind the whole game — just like against Glenn — and all of a sudden get a little spark.
“Our seniors are leading us; that’s where we’re at,” he added. “That’s a tribute to them for the last two games to be behind and be able to battle back and get it done.”
LaVille got it done at the line. The Lancers made a living from the stripe with a nearly flawless 25-of-28 conversion, including 11 of 12 free throws in the final stanza for a 13-point swing and the win.
Junior forward Kaitlyn Kopetski was especially impressive from the foul line, attacking Culver’s 1-3-1 zone from the the elbow for a career-high 16 points on perfect 10-for-10 free throw shooting. Senior forward Cori Lindke drained 6-of-8 free throws herself working off the low post in the second half en route to 13 points for the night as the Lancers won their fourth straight in a reprisal for last year’s Winning Edge championship loss to the Cavs.

“We were giving them some outside shots, and they were giving us the high post. Sometimes we get on (Kopetski) because she tries to pass too much, but she got it going and she did a great job and really kept us in it,” said McCullough. “Lindke got going in the second half down there. Really, who got going, (point guard Elaine Schmeltz) got going a little bit, and that’s why we really came to life.”
LaVille also took care of the lane on the defensive end.
Hannah Amor and Kaitlyn Kopetski doubled down on 6-1 Culver post player Gwen Zehner, while Cori Lindke rotated on her and senior guard Emily Fuller helped on her as well to hold Zehner to 12 points for the night, barely better than half her average of 22.5 points a game heading into the outing.
“Hannah Amor did an excellent job when she was in there. Hannah got in a little foul trouble, but the other girls — Kopets and Cori — did a nice job on her. All of our eight girls did a nice job on her,” said McCullough.
“They even triple-teamed her a couple times,” said Culver assistant coach Stephanie Alva, filling in at the helm for head coach Ashli Faulkner, who had her first child over the break. “She’s just got to get better at being strong with the ball in there and dishing it back out. That was the thing that we really didn’t do. We knew the weak side was open, but getting it to the weak side was kind of hard for us.”
LaVille’s defense extended beyond the post and into the full court as the Lancers began pressing in the fourth, cranking up the game tempo and taking Culver out of its offense.
“We pushed the ball, and we made some errors there at the beginning of the fourth quarter that were just simple errors... and we just need to make sure that we play our game, and we didn’t,” Alva said. “Sometimes pushing the ball is not our game so I think we got out of our game, and the press got us out of our game.”
Zehner finished with a game-high 13 rebounds despite her substandard scoring, and Culver did see strong offensive production from defensive sparkplug Whitney Sanders, who finished with game highs of five steals and 17 points at LaVille.
“She’s our defensive player. She gets after it for us,” Alva said of Sanders. “We told her there at the beginning of the game that she could not reach, that’s kind of her kryptonite. She’s a great defensive player; she got a couple steals in there and got us back in the game there. She had a very good game... She created a couple turnovers and things like that for us, so she had a great game for us.”
While the Lancers look for the fifth straight win and first-ever tourney championship against North Judson at 7:30 p.m. tonight, Culver looks to snap a five-game skid in the consolation game against Caston, which lost to Judson 54-30 in the opener Tuesday.
“We are larger in size than them. We know they’re a little bit quicker, but we should be able to dominate them inside,” said Alva. “Hopefully, that will be one of our first wins in awhile.
“We’ve had several injuries and just keeping the same momentum going, we’ve just been up and down lately, so hopefully we’ll get a win tomorrow.”
• LAVILLE 46,
  CULVER COMMUNITY 39
At LaVille Winning Edge Holiday Tourney
Score by quarters
LV:   2  15  24  46
CC:  8  17  30  39
LAVILLE (46): Emily Fuller 0 0-0 0, Elaine Schmeltz 1 4-4 6, Jesse Feitz 0 0-0 0, Anna Boits 1 2-2 5, Kaitlyn Kopetski 3 10-10 16, Shelby Low 1 0-0 2, Cori Lindke 3 6-8 13, Hannah Amor 1 2-2 3; Totals: 10 25-28 46.
CULVER (39): Nicole Carnegie 3 0-2 6, Susannah Baker 1 1-2 3, Whitney Sanders 7 0-0 16, Alison Zehner 0 0-0 2, Cindy Miller 0 0-0 0, Gwen Zehner 4 2-7 12; Totals:  15 3-11 39.
3-point goals: LaVille 1 (Boits), Culver 2 (Sanders 2); Rebounds: LaVille 30 (Kopetski 6, Lindke 5, Amor 5), Culver 29 (G. Zehner 13); Assists: LaVille 4 (Schmeltz 2), Culver 6 (A. Zehner 2); Steals: LaVille 7 (Schmeltz 3), Culver 17 (Sanders 5, Baker 4, G. Zehner 3); Turnovers: LaVille 24, Culver 19; Blocked shots: LaVille 0, Culver 3 (G. Zehner 2); Fouls (fouled out): LaVille 15 (Fuller), Culver 19 (None).
Records: LaVille 8-2, Culver 5-6.