It was not the prettiest of Washington county rivalries last night, but you could say that it was long, and maybe even record breaking.
In a foul heavy game Washington found a way to get the win over Mid-Prairie last night 54-44.
The game had a total of 52 fouls and 73 total free throws combined between both teams, with 48 of those being shot by the Demons.
Washington dominated early in the first quarter, holding the Golden Hawks off the scoreboard with a full court press until 3:49 left in the first quarter. Mid-Prairie battled and came within one of the Demons after a 3-pointer by Ali Riggan to make the score 11-10 after one. Both teams opened up in the second, with Mid-Prairie captalizing on some fast breaks and once again the three ball by Riggan pulled the Golden Hawks within one at half 27-26.
In the third Washington pulled away with a 40-34 lead, and kept that distance on their way to the 54-44 win.
Mid-Prairie head coach Stephen Bender said it was the first game of the season and you could tell.
“You could definetely tell it was our first game, that’s for sure,” Bender said. “I thought our girls played hard, you could tell that it was our first game and that we don’t have a lot of experience. Washington is a good team, they are very athletic and they pressure the ball a lot, they are very quick and I just felt that we were very tentative against their press even in the half court. Offensively, I think we had 23 turnovers, when you turn the ball over that many times it is tough to win.”
Mid-Prairie was led by Courtney Cayton with eight points, while the Demons were led by Dema Giardino with 17 points on the night, and Stephanie Fishback with 13 points.
Washington held Taylor Kurtz to just one point all night from the free throw line, and had quite a few rebounds despite a significant height different. Demon head coach Phil Long said he was impressed with the ability to get rebounds, but there was another area of the game his team needs to work on.
“I think that is three games in a row that we held our own in the rebounds stats, I’ll have to see what the totals are, [but] with how much height was given up, our kids sure battled hard,” Long Said. “I think the biggest thing that we need to work on for Williamsburg is we don’t identify who we have in the half court, and they were taking it 84 feet, running it down the floor and laying it in before we had our head turned around, but we haven’t play a whole lot of half court man, it is just stuff that we are working on for the conference run, and it showed it’s weaknesses tonight, but that is why it is early in December and we have a lot of practice time ahead of us.”
Washington moves to 2-0 and will play Williamsburg tomorrow night, while Mid-Prairie falls to 0-1 on the season and plays North Cedar at home on Friday.