Pahranagat Valley blitzed the Beatty Hornets, 27-5, in the first quarter of their Jan. 18 league game in Alamo and coasted to a 56-12 win.
Morgan Harris got 12 of her game-high 18 points that quarter. During the same quarter, juniors Jessica Brede, McKenzie Poulsen, and Taylor Higbee also contributed at least four points each for the Lady Panthers.
“We played good defense,” said Coach Amy Huntsman. “We also pushed the ball well. We finally had a good shooting game. We also did better with free throws and our buckets were falling.”
Pahranagat was 6-of-10 at the foul line, Beatty was 1-for-2.
Defensively, Pahranagat had the Hornets completely stymied. Beatty scored only eight points in the first half and four in the second.
Pahranagat only allowed Beatty 10 points in 2018 and 14 in 2009.
Admittedly, the Lady Panthers (5-10, 3-0), are a young, mostly inexperienced squad with only one returning senior starter, but, as Huntsman now feels, “It is coming together the way I believed they would as the season began and I’m very, very proud of them.”
Harris, a senior, said, “We are working together a lot better. At the beginning of the season, I’m not really sure why we were not doing that so well, but now there is more teamwork, team bonding, and communication on the floor.”
It was Pahranagat’s 15th consecutive win over Beatty (1-5, 0-1) since 2007.
As Huntsman has noted before, “It doesn’t really matter how you play in December, but more how you are playing in February,” and the Panther girls will be making a definite push to once again make the regional playoffs, Feb. 21-23, in Reno.
This week, the Panthers had two league games, at home against Word of Life, on Thursday, Jan. 24, and at Indian Springs on Friday.
Their final home game of the league season will be Feb. 8 against Green Valley Christian, then a non-league regular season finale with defending Class 2A state champion White Pine in Alamo, Feb. 14.
