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Goodhart’s Double Double Leads Wildcats To Big Win
The Rockbridge County High School girls basketball team split a pair of Valley District games last week, suffering a 52-26 road loss to Spotswood last Tuesday before earning a 39-31 home win over Turner Ashby on Friday night in Lexington.
Against Turner Ashby, in their final home game of the regular season, the Wildcats (9-11 overall, 3-8 district) got an impressive performance from Ruby Goodhart, who led all players with 21 points and 10 rebounds, hitting one 3-pointer early in the first quarter, and had one block. “Ruby played great,” said RC head coach Darrell Plogger.
Also stepping up for RC was Lola Mulitalo with six points, six rebounds and a steal, while Abby Bouchard had five points, seven rebounds, a block and a steal. Plogger said Mulitalo is “just tough. She gives us rebounding and defense. Scoring’s a bonus, but she plays hard all the time.”
The win was the Wildcats’ first victory over TA (12-7, 6-3) in recent history, and it was a much different story than when the teams met on Jan. 14 in Bridgewater, when the Knights cruised to a 77-29 win.
The rematch was close the whole way. The Knights led 8-7 at the end of the first quarter and held a small lead for much of the second quarter until Goodhart made an inside basket to tie the game at 17-17. Mulitalo then found Lexi Samante for an inside basket to give the Wildcats the lead, and Mulitalo made a pair of free throws. TA’s Ava Myers scored on a putback at the end of the half to cut RC’s lead to 21-19.
The Wildcats scored the first nine points of the second half, which included an inside shot from Mulitalo, a threepoint play by Goodhart, a 3-pointer from Emma Clark, and a free throw by Bouchard. The Wildcats held TA to four points in the quarter and took a 30-23 lead into the fourth quarter.
The Wildcats struggled to score for most of the fourth quarter, with Mulitalo hitting an inside basket, but those were RC’s only two points until the final two minutes. TA only managed four points in that stretch, cutting RC’s lead to 32-27, before Goodhart made an inside shot with about a minute left. After a TA turnover, Bouchard went to the line and made two free throws. The rest of the game was decided at the foul line, with Goodhart hitting 3-of-4 free throws in the final minute.
In addition to his usual leaders, Plogger was proud of Lexi Samante, who stepped up in place of two injured starters, Bella Dorey and Dez Butler, both out with concussions. Samante, who recently moved up from the junior varsity team, scored two points, had an assist, and played strong defense. Plogger said Samente “played great minutes for us.”
Natalie Samante added two points, four rebounds, two steals and an assist, while Madison Mangione, another player who moved up from the JV level, had three rebounds, two assists and two steals.
TA’s leaders were Rowen Smith with 13 points and Gianna Carderelli with 12 points, including two 3-pointers.
The Wildcats committed 15 turnovers, reaching their goal of 15 or fewer, while the Knights had 16 turnovers.
Before the game, the Wildcats honored Clark, their lone senior, who scored three points and played strong defense, grabbing four rebounds and a steal. A four-year varsity guard who’s a talented outside shooter and defender, Clark has been a valuable leader of the Wildcats and a big part of the team’s improvement to put them in a position to advance to next week’s Region 3C tournament, after the Wildcats went 2-20 in each of the last two seasons. She has committed to continuing her basketball career at Division III school Bridgewater College next year.
“It was nice to win one for Emma,” said Plogger. “She’s been through the good times and bad times here and kept a good attitude. She works hard and has been a huge part of our success this year.”
Grateful for a special senior night and a special season, Clark said, “I couldn’t be prouder of all the girls and their hard work this year, especially being a senior. It meant a lot that they cared so much that they wanted me to feel a good win, especially since this program’s been looked down on, and it hasn’t been looked at the way it should be.”
Clark said Plogger, in his second year as RC’s head coach, has “done a really good job of keeping us going, and I think that we were blessed to be able to work as much as we could and just be able to win.”
After this season, Clark said, “I’m definitely gonna miss this whole team because they all just feel like a big family to me. I’m just gonna miss getting to see all of them grow, not only as players, but as people. I’m just gonna miss coming after school to practice and being able to have fun with all of them.”
SHS 52, RC 26
The Wildcats suffered a 52-26 road loss to Spotswood on Tuesday of last week.
With the win, Spotswood (17-3, 12-0) completed a sweep of the regular-season series with the Wildcats. When the teams met at RC on Jan. 13, Spotswood won 50-22.
In the rematch, the Trailblazers raced to a 21-2 lead in the first quarter and didn’t look back, taking a 32-9 lead into halftime. Spotswood ended the week on a 13-game winning streak.
Spotswood’s Georgia Jones led all players with 11 points, while teammate Alana Fisher added 10 points, and Alana Taylor chipped in eight.
Goodhart paced RC with nine points and six rebounds, while Bouchard, Clark and Mangione each scored five points.
RC committed 18 turnovers, while Spotswood had just five.
The Wildcats were scheduled to play at Rocktown on Monday before traveling to William Monroe last night. They’ll conclude the regular season at East Rockingham on Thursday, starting with JV action at 5:30 p.m.
