FORRESTON — The Lady Hubs varsity basketball team came within one possession of taking down the Stockton Lady Blackhawks for their first victory of the season Friday evening during the Forreston Thanksgiving Tournament.

Trailing by two points with less than 45 seconds remaining, Rochelle committed a critical turnover that gave the ball back to Stockton. Behind 6-foot-2-inch senior Emily Offenheiser, the Lady Blackhawks edged the Lady Hubs 63-58 and sent Rochelle down to 0-2 overall.

“[Emily] just had her way with rebounds,” head coach Tony Rowan said. “It was like Goliath beating David. A lot of her 26 points came from offensive rebounds and putbacks… Our shooting performance that game wasn’t stellar either.”

Rochelle led Stockton 14-12 after the first quarter, but the Lady Cardinals outscored the Lady Hubs 11-6 in the second quarter to take a 23-20 lead at halftime. While the Rochelle defense made things difficult for Stockton, the Lady Hubs made just 25 percent of their shots in the first half.

“I’m very happy with how we’re progressing in our offensive sets and how we’re getting open shots,” Rowan said. “We just need to put the ball in the kids’ hands and have them be ready to shoot it… We started off cold and we turned it up in the second half, but we need to be more consistent and we need to put together four full quarters instead of one half.”

Senior Morgan Baker led the charge for Rochelle, scoring a team-high 21 points and shooting 9-for-20 from the field. Senior Jacie Wyatt scored 10 points on 5-of-8 shooting and added four steals, while junior Abby Lundquist chipped in 13 points and five steals.

Baker also grabbed six rebounds and totaled three steals in the game, and Rowan said afterward that the focus for Baker this season will be not only showing versatility on the court, but reigniting her passion for basketball.

“We’ve talked about getting her back to just having fun playing basketball,” Rowan said. “She admitted that it felt a little bit like work to her last year, but this year we’ve made it more fun for her. We’ve given her more freedom and she’s excelling with that. We’re expecting more out of her on defense, and while she may be a point guard during a few of our sets, she may be a power forward in the next set.”

Friday’s game was the first time this year that Rochelle found itself within five points or less in the fourth quarter. Despite losing the game, Rowan said the team’s mistakes down the stretch will help the girls learn and improve as the season progresses.

“It’s going to be a short learning curve for most of our girls because we have three players who have received a lot of playing time on varsity,” Rowan said. “The bulk of the team hasn’t gotten those varsity minutes, so hopefully we’ll be able to work through those moments earlier in the season so we’re comfortable when the postseason rolls around.”