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The Rockbridge County High School girls basketball game snapped its 10-game losing streak last Wednesday, earning a 54-46 home win over Riverheads in Lexington. On Friday, the Wildcats suffered a 60-23 road loss to defending Valley District champion Spotswood.
In nondistrict action against Riverheads, the Wildcats (2-12) jumped out to an early double-digit lead and stayed ahead for most of the game, putting up their highest point total of the season.
After trailing 10-8 late in the first quarter, the Wildcats applied their defensive press and went on a 14-0 run, with Rachel Hines making three of her game-high nine steals during that stretch.
“She is our fireball on defense,” said RC head coach Andrew Bellairs of Hines. “She didn’t have the best shooting night, but, man, she was all over the ball. I think people don’t realize how sneaky athletic she is.”
RC led 15-10 after the first quarter before stretching the lead to 12 earlier in the second quarter. Riverheads made some baskets and free throws to cut the Wildcats’ advantage to 29-23 by halftime.
In the third quarter, the Gladiators continued to battle back, cutting the lead to three. The Wildcats took a 36-33 lead into the fourth quarter.
Anna Shirley made a three-point play to tie the game at 36-36 just 13 seconds into the fourth quarter, and Riverheads took its first lead since the first quarter by going up 38-37 about a minute later.
The game remained close the rest of the way, and it was tied 43-43 before Bouchard hit a 3-pointer. Emma Clark then sank another triple to put RC up 49-43 with 2:07 left, but Grace Golladay sank a triple for the Gladiators to cut the lead to 49-46. Hines then made an inside bucket, and the Wildcats prevented Riverheads from scoring the rest of the way. A free throw and an inside basket from Clark sealed the win.
Clark led all scorers with 14 points, knocking down three 3-pointers. Rachel Hines added 10 points, eight rebounds and four assists, while Lola Mulitalo scored nine points and grabbed five rebounds and five steals.
Maddie Dahl contributed eight points, six boards and four assists for RC. Abby Bouchard had seven points, sinking two 3-pointers, five assists, four rebounds, a steal and a block. McKenzie Hines chipped in four points and three rebounds. The Wildcats made five 3-pointers while holding Riverheads to two.
Pleased by his team’s improvement, Bellairs said, “We are crazy, crazy, crazy energetic all the time. If there’s anything you saw out there, we are hustling a little more. Offensively, we put Maddie in the middle. I thought she did a great job distributing and taking some people away, and that opened up the court for Emma [Clark].”
“Really, that energy and that defense, we gave them a lot of easy baskets, but sometimes that’s just because we have so much energy,” added Bellairs. “We lose track of people.”
Bellairs said he and assistant coach Anna Rasmussen had been working with Clark on her footwork to make her a better shooter. “She took that and ran with it,” said Bellairs of Clark. “She had a great night. She was shooting it really well.”
Abby Ralston led Riverheads with 11 points, Taia Chandler added 10 points, and Shirley and Alexis Myrtle contributed nine points each. The Gladiators ended the week at 4-7.
RC committed 24 turnovers while Riverheads had 27 turnovers.
Bellairs said the Wildcats should’ve kept the game from being close, but he acknowledged they are still learning. “We should’ve put them away early, but we couldn’t do it, but that’s OK,” he said. “We’re figuring out our offense, but if we can put up 50 to 60 [points] we’re gonna play a lot better.”
SHS 60, RC 23
The Wildcats suffered a 60-23 road loss to Spotswood on Friday night.
Zoli Khalil, a Division I signee with Virginia Commonwealth University and the Class 3 state player of the year as a junior last year, led the Trailblazers (12-2, 3-0) to the win, scoring 28 points – 18 in the first half. Last week, Khalil was nominated for the 2023 McDonald’s All American Games.
Alana Taylor added 11 points for Spotswood, while Madison Doss chipped in eight.
Bouchard and Dahl led RC with seven points each, with Dahl grabbing six rebounds and dishing out three assists. Mulitalo added six points and two steals, while Parker Dameron hit a 3-pointer.
Despite the lopsided loss, Bellairs said, “I actually thought it was one of our best games in terms of offensive movement and defensive movement in the half-court. We made a lot of costly mistakes and gave them easy buckets because of our turnovers against the press. They did a great job forcing us into some tough spots.” For the game, the Wildcats committed 29 turnovers.
Bellairs said Dahl “had an outstanding game defensively, and we used her to run our offense through the middle. I feel like we got a lot of great looks in the half-court.”
In the end, Bellairs said, “The pressure of playing a team of that caliber got in our heads at the start and made us too nervous to make the right plays. Overall, though, a great lesson for us that, at least in the halfcourt, we can keep up with anyone on both ends.”
The Wildcats were scheduled to play at Turner Ashby last night and will continue district action with home games against Broadway on Friday and Harrisonburg on Tuesday. Both nights will start with junior varsity action at 5:30 p.m.
