ADA — Senior Alexis Kirkbride (Zanesville/Bishop Rosecrans) poured in a career-best 15 points as the No. 15-ranked Ohio Northern women's basketball team powered past Capital 64-38 in its Ohio Athletic Conference opener on Saturday afternoon at the ONU Sports Center.
With their fifth consecutive victory, the Polar Bears improve to 5-1 overall and 1-0 in the OAC, while the Crusaders drop to 2-3, 0-1.
Kirkbride was a blistering 5-for-6 from the 3-point line, tallying a career-high 15 points to lead the Polar Bears offensively.
Sophomore Nate Barcaskey (Moon Township, Pa./Moon Area) won the individual title at heavyweight to lead the Ohio Northern wrestling team to a second-place finish at the 37th annual ONU Invitational on Saturday.
The Polar Bears had a strong outing, finishing the tournament with 11 wrestlers placers in eight of the 10 weight classes.
It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas in downtown Ada. On Friday volunteers decorated the depot park. Here is Jill Simmons and in the next photos Heather Cox of LNB places a string of lights on shrubbery. (Monty Siekerman photos)
By Cort Reynolds
ADA - The Ada boys basketball team tipped off its season with a convincing 53-35 victory over visiting Hardin County rival Ridgemont Friday night in the season opener.
The Bulldogs held youthful Ridgemont without a field goal over the final 8:44, and outscored the Gophers 17-5 in the fourth period to finalize the win.
"We did a much better job defending in the second half," said Ada second-year head coach Dre White. "We only allowed four two-point field goals the entire second half.
PHOTO AT BOTTOM: Rev. Dr. David MacDonald, ONU chaplain, leads off the Kappa Phi sing-a-thon on Saturday. His song says he wants a hippopotamus for Christmas...hint. Know where to buy one?
By Monty Siekerman
Kappa Phi has held a 24-hour sing-a-thon prior to Christmas for nearly 40 years, and this year the money raised will go to a foundation that assists with research for Reflux Sympathetic Dystrophy (RSD), a painful disorder.
Theresa Meli of Middleburg Heights, a senior forensics major and a member of Kappa Phi has RSD and received the honor of being the Polar Bear at the beginning of the fundraiser.