There was never much of a doubt for the W.F. West girls basketball team on Wednesday, as the Bearcats raced out to a massive lead and cruised to a 61-17 win over Shelton.
W.F. West blanked Shelton in the first quarter, shutting them out while jumping out to a 20-0 lead.
“We used to get them a little more,” W.F. West coach Kyle Karnofski joked about the shutout quarter. “It’s kind of nice to do that. It makes you feel good.”
The defensive dominance continued throughout the rest of the game, as the Highclimbers scored just six in the second, three in the third, and eight in the fourth, never catching the mark the Bearcats (13-3, 8-0 2A EvCo) put up in the first eight minutes.
“I thought we did a good job of being in a stance defensively,” Karnofski said. “I thought we anticipated well. We did a good job of reading where they were going and getting traps and steals.”
The Bearcats didn’t stop at 20, though, of course. After 14 points in the second, the Bearcats put up 21 more in the third, taking a 55-9 lead into the final frame.
Julia Dalan led all scorers with 20 points, while Dilyn Boeck scored 15 and Joy Cushman tallied eight. By the end of the night, ten different Bearcats had gotten on the scoresheet.
“I thought our group played well tonight all together,” Karnofski said. “We shared the ball well, and we had a lot of contributions from everybody across the board.”
W.F. West will put its unbeaten league record on the line on Tuesday in a rematch with second-place Black Hills. The Bearcats handed the Wolves their only league loss to this point with a 59-38 win on Dec. 14.
