Nesselrodt's 33 points lift James Wood girls past Handley

WINCHESTER — James Wood senior guard Brynna Nesselrodt has made a habit of lighting up scoreboards this season.

On Friday night, she did it better than just about everyone else who’s worn a Colonels uniform.

Nesselrodt scored a career-high 33 points — tied for ninth-most in a single game in James Wood history — to lead the Colonels to a 59-50 win over Handley in a Class 4 Northwestern District game at the Judges’ Maddex-Omps Gymnasium.

It took a total team effort for James Wood (5-6, 2-2 district) to beat the Judges (5-8, 2-3), who fought hard throughout Friday’s game. Handley led 19-12 with 6:32 left in the second quarter, trailed by only three points at halftime (32-29), and refused to go away after James Wood took a 47-31 lead with 2:16 left in the third quarter, cutting its deficit to 58-48 with 3:21 left in the fourth quarter.

“We all did good and all played as a team,” Nesselrodt said.

But there was no question who led the James Wood charge. Nesselrodt made 10 of her field goal attempts — connecting on 9 of her last 11 shots — and hit six total 3-pointers to help the Colonels rally past Handley on “Douglas Bulldogs Night.” The Judges wore blue and white Douglas School replica jerseys as part of a celebration of the Winchester school that educated Black students from 1927-66.

Nesselrodt scored 10 points as James Wood outscored the Judges 20-8 in the last six minutes of the second quarter, then poured in 12 points in the third quarter as the Colonels extended their lead from 32-29 to 52-39.

Nesselrodt — who made 7 of 12 free throw attempts — also had six rebounds.

Friday marked the fifth time in 11 games that Nesselrodt has scored at least 22 points. Her career high for the Colonels came when she scored 30 points last year.

“I was proud of myself, because I haven’t been catching and shooting as quickly as I normally would,” Nesselrodt said. “I worked hard [to get that point total].”

As stellar as Nesselrodt was on Friday, the Colonels pulled away early in the third quarter as a result of its defense and sophomore guard Madison Shirley, who scored seven of her season-high 11 points in a 9-2 run in the first three minutes and 42 seconds.

Handley missed its first five field goal attempts of the second half and committed eight of its 19 turnovers in the third quarter. Shirley had a layup following one of her five total steals to make it 41-31.

“We just settled into what we normally do,” James Wood coach Sanford Silver said. “We want pressure defense. I think everybody saw that we pressure the ball very well, and tried to limit the number of fouls from what we’d done earlier.”

Nesselrodt and Jolie Jenkins have scored 68 percent of James Wood’s points this season, so it’s always big if someone else can aid in the scoring effort.

Shirley opened the second-half scoring with a 3-pointer and hit another jumper from just inside the arc. In addition to Shirley’s big game, James Wood also received seven points each from Nayah Edwards (five assists) and Josie Russell (eight rebounds).

“We’ve been working with Shirley on the 3-ball in practice, and even the mid-range, and she’s coming along very well,” Silver said.

After Shirley made it 41-31, Nesselrodt scored 11 points in two minutes starting with the 3:09 mark of the third quarter, hitting one 3-pointer each from the left, middle and right sides of the court as part of that stretch.

“I just knew when I let it go, that it was going in,” Nesselrodt said. “It just felt right.”

James Wood has now four of it last five games, only losing 47-40 on Thursday night to Meridian in that stretch. The Colonels only have two players who aren’t freshmen or sophomores on their 11-girl roster.

“I think this season is a real learning curve for being so young,” Silver said. “But I think as the season gets longer, we are getting a little bit better. We really rely on our defense to turn into offense to ease pressure off of Nesselrodt.”

Led by Laura Hogan (15 points overall, 10 rebounds in the last three quarters) and Olivia Jett (12 points), Handley battled, but the Judges couldn’t slow down Nesselrodt. Handley’s foul trouble made it difficult to apply too much pressure on Nesselrodt.

The Judges made things interesting when Hogan’s putback made it 58-48 with 3:21 left, but Handley made just 1 of its 7 shot attempts from there.

“I’m proud of our girls for staying in the game and fighting back [after falling behind by 16 in the second half],” Judges first-year head coach and former assistant Katlyn Orndorff said. “I think we had a good game plan. We just didn’t execute the little things.”

Handley won only one game last year, so to have five wins at this point and compete well against a local rival shows the team’s growth.

“We were getting blown out in a lot of games last year,” Orndorff said. “Now we’re hanging around and fighting in games. We’ve just got to find a way to overcome and finish.

“We focus a lot this year on team bonding and bringing the girls together. We’re just pushing ourselves in practice to work hard and get better together.”

On Monday, Handley travels to Skyline and James Wood travels to Hampshire (W.Va.).

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