WOOD GIRLS BEAT COUGARS 50-24

December 21, 2011
By KEVIN TRUDGEON

WINCHESTER- If absence makes the heart grow fonder, the James Wood girls' basketball team was itching for a victory over Kettle Run Tuesday evening.

It had been two weeks since the Colonels had last tasted the thrill of victory - a 55-37 win over the same Cougars back on Dec. 6 - and Rhonda Slider's squad wanted to snap the two-game slide it was on.

"Last week we had a down week," said Slider, referring to her team's losses to Stonewall Jackson (62-41) and Washington (54-46). "We were coming off two losses last week and we pushed and we pushed and pushed in practice since then.

"We talked about intensity and being able to come out strong in the first quarter and play strong the entire game."

After James Wood (4-2) raced out to a 16-2 lead in the first quarter and cruised to a 50-24 win over the visiting Cougars, it's obvious the message was received loud and clear.

Kettle Run (2-6) did not score its first basket until nearly six minutes had run off the clock and managed just two field goals total in the first half against a swarming Colonels defense that forced 38 turnovers on the night. "We talked before the game about coming out and having our defense, hopefully, make our offense work," Slider said. "We've been having a hard time getting the offense going and getting into a groove. So we basically relied on our defense to spark the offense and I thought we did a good job of that."

Employing a full-court press that utilized traps and pressure, James Wood had the Cougars out of their comfort zone almost from the start.

Kettle Run missed its first eight shots and committed 10 turnovers before sophomore guard Addy Foudray knocked down a jumper to end the scoreless drought with 2:10 remaining in the first quarter.

By then, though, the Colonels had the game well in hand.

Senior guard Sarah Callaham opened the game with a jumper from the wing that kick started a 14-0 run.

Sophomore guard Whitney Dick nailed a jumper, freshman point guard Danielle Rizzari had back-to-back steals for layups and Dick found junior forward Paige Bridgeforth open under the basket for an easy two points before Foudray managed to get Kettle Run on the board.

"Basically we just came out and shot ourselves in the foot right off the bat," said Kettle Run coach Sarah Ventresco, whose team did not score its second field goal until there were two minutes remaining in the second quarter and trailed 24-4 at halftime.

"It's something we've been struggling with as far as playing four quarters. We tell our girls every game that we have to play four quarters and we didn't tonight, we played two. And you can't be competitive when you only play two quarters."

The Colonels would extend the lead to 30-4 early in the third quarter - thanks to a layup and a pull-up jumper by Rizzari and two free throws from junior forward Erica Hepner (four points, six rebounds) - before the Cougars finally found some success.

After missing her first five shots from the field, Kettle Run senior Sami Vance got going in the second half, scoring all of her game-high 16 points in the third and fourth quarters to stop the bleeding somewhat.

The Cougars trailed by 22 heading into the fourth quarter but managed to cut the deficit to 38-21 after six straight points from Vance.

James Wood, however, answered right back with a 7-0 run of it own that included six straight points in the span of 33 seconds as Dick (five points, five rebounds) scored on a putback, Rizzari found Hepner for a layup off a steal and Callaham (eight points) picked off a pass and scored to put the game away.

Slider said that a big reason her team was able to get back to its winning ways was the play of its freshman point guard Rizzari, who finished with a team-high 14 points to go along with four rebounds, four assists and six steals.

"She did a really nice job for us," Slider said. "We've been pushing her to go after it defensively a little bit more, to go after the ball handlers, and she did that tonight. She played a great game, I was very happy with her play tonight."

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