The St. Louis girls and
Washington-Marion boys maintained good, early season form on the opening
night of District 4-4A basketball
play on Tuesday, with the Saints beating W-M 49-31 in the girls
game, and the homestanding Charging Indians winning the boys
game 58-49.
In the girls game, St. Louis (14-8, 1-0) gave up a basket to start the game then went on a 21-2 run to take control. Jada
Peltier scored 11 of her game-high 23 points during the run.
Saints head coach Tony Johnson said he liked what he saw on both sides of the court.
“We came out ready to play,” Johnson
said. “We had to shut some people down. (Washington-Marion guard
Monasha) Eddie is a
good player. We were able to play good defense and allow 31
points. Our goal is to give up 10 points a quarter, and tonight
we were at 7.5. That says a lot about the girls, they are working
hard on the defensive end.
“Jada is coming out of the shell. She really took it to the next level. That is her job as a senior. As a senior on this team,
Coach Johnson is looking for you to be his leader. We have four of them and they are all great leaders, but the team goes
as Jada goes. Tonight, we were clicking on all cylinders.”
W-M (6-12, 0-1) scored the first seven points of the second quarter to pull within 14, but never got closer. St. Louis responded
with 11 straight points, the first nine by Peltier.
Ashley Cherry W-M with 10 points.
In the boys game, W-M (14-5, 1-0) never trailed and started the second quarter with a 14-2 run to extend a four-point lead
to 16.
“We were running, taking care of the ball and not turning it over,” said W-M head coach Albert Hartwell. “We were controlling
the ball, seeing each other, making good passes and playing good defense.”
St. Louis (8-13, 0-1) made a couple of
second-half runs to get back into the game, scoring nine straight in the
third quarter
to get within six, then 10 straight in the fourth quarter to get
within five with 1:09 remaining. W-M scored the final four
points of the game from the free-throw line to seal the win.
“We turned the ball over,” Hartwell
said of the second half. “Everyone was trying to be a hero. That’s the
youth in us. We
try to do things we are not supposed to do. Our kids got inactive
and then we had three or four silly turnovers. We were trying
to get a dunk, got too happy. We can’t lighten up. But, they are
learning.”
Mark Vital led W-M with a game-high 21
points. Karlis Gardner led St. Louis with 11, including four during the
Saints’ fourth-quarter
run.