Staff photo / John Vargo Mineral Ridge’s Danielle Aulet, left, drives past Grand Valley’s Analiese Canfield on Wednesday in the Rams’ 59-22 victory.

MINERAL RIDGE — Mineral Ridge is used to slow starts.

In addition, there were 36 turnovers between the teams — in the first half.

The eighth-seeded Rams didn’t let either factor bother them in the second half Wednesday as they surged past ninth-seeded Grand Valley, 59-22, in a Division III sectional first-round game.

Mineral Ridge (12-11) outscored Grand Valley (8-15) 20-5 in the third quarter.

Some of those frustrations for the Rams in the first 16 minutes were due to a change in defense by the Mustangs.

Mineral Ridge was 8-of-27 from the floor in the first half.

“I don’t know if it was just the nerves, or trying to figure out the other team — what they’re going to do,” Mineral Ridge coach Matt Cluse said. “Usually when we play somebody, they change what they’re doing. That team has been playing man on film. Then they come out playing zone. Our girls were not ready for that. They were ready for man, and we had to make some adjustments against the zone.

“Then it comes against zone you have to knock some shots down. We didn’t knock a few shots down early, so it puts you in a position where it’s a slow-scoring start.”

Grand Valley trailed 24-13 at the half. However, the Mustangs had 20 turnovers at halftime and 31 for the game. Allison Larned led GV with 10 points, while Alexis Mahaffey had 15 rebounds.

Mineral Ridge’s Fran Kesner, who was able to drive the lane quite often against Grand Valley, had a game-high 23 points. Alexa Harkins added 12 points and 10 rebounds. Morgan Sigley added nine boards as the Rams outrebounded the Mustangs, 38-26.

Kesner was proud of the way her team responded after halftime.

“We played as a team,” she said. “We finally came together and wanted to play to win.”

The highlight for the Rams had to be at the free-throw line as Mineral Ridge went 14-of-14 — nothing they’re used to seeing.

“We usually miss a lot of foul shots,” Kesner said. “It was important for us to make them.”

Saturday, Mineral Ridge needs any advantage it can get at top-seeded Champion in a sectional bracket final, starting at 1 p.m. The Golden Flashes were in the stands watching the first half.

“We’re going to need to a lot better against Champion,” Cluse said. “We have to play perfect, sound basketball if we want to beat Champion.

“We didn’t play great tonight by any means. It wasn’t a great performance, but you can go on the floor and beat a team by (almost) 40 and hold them to 20, you’re doing OK. If we can play better than that today, we can give Champion a game.”