STERLING Heaven Bennett, all 6 feet of her, is not afraid to admit that sometimes her Bureau Valley Storm gets antsy when finding open looks.

"I think we just get too excited under the basket, and just throw it up there," Bennett said. "It's silly."

Using its height advantage Wednesday against short-handed Newman, the Storm made just few than one-third of their field goals. However, they quickly made up for it with plenty of quick reaches on the offensive glass in a 48-34 road win.

On a night in which the Storm (10-11, 3-5 TRAC East) made just 18 of 65 shots, they amassed 50 rebounds 28 of which came after their own misses. Setting the tone of the game early, the Storm had 14 second-chance opportunities in the first half. Sometimes the Storm misses led to third- and fourth-chance opportunities.

"We're one of the taller teams around here, and using it to our advantage is one of our stronger points," Bennett said. "It's helped us rebound the ball, get up on the basket, and make our shots."

Bennett had three offensive grabs in the first half, while fellow 6-footer Irini Petros had five pulls from the paint after coming off of the bench.

"I told the girls that if they wouldn't have been rebounding, I wouldn't have been very happy," Bureau Valley coach Tiffany Gonigam said. "They stuck with it. It's easy to get defeated when you miss easy baskets, but they kept boxing out and getting the rebounds. We struggled with that the past couple of games, so it was good to see."

The Comets' height disadvantage was noted right from the start as Sarah Trujillo's 5-foot frame went up against 6'2" Carlie Bickett in the opening jump ball. Having clearly won possession, the Storm raced out to a 7-2 lead and didn't look back.

Newman (5-12, 3-3) struggled without the services of sophomore lead rebounder Mary Jensen and sophomore lead scorer Kelsey Simpson. Jensen was unavailable due to a class field trip, while Simpson sat out under the weather. This transferred the bulk of the Comets' services to Trujillo and Aubree Schmidt. While short on inches, the Comets used its speed to prevent a catastrophe and keep the game to within 11 points with a couple of minutes left in the game.

Bureau Valley led 25-15 at halftime, using a 14-7 second quarter to establish a lead which would remain for most of the duration.

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Storm down Comets