The Washington Demons are on the road for the first time in the new year as they visit Burlington Notre Dame in a basketball doubleheader tonight that you can hear on KCII. In the girls’ game, Washington will try to make it back-to-back wins to tip off January. The Demons are 6-3 thanks in part to senior forward Alex Murphy, who is almost averaging a double-double with better than 11 points and nine rebounds per game. Freshmen Adalyn Long and Leighton Messinger have been instant-impact additions and are combining to score 19 points a game. But Demons head coach Shannon Rugg tells KCII Sports that his team is still searching for a signature victory.

“We’ve still got a lot of work to do,” Rugg says, “and we’re going to need some kids to step up here in the second half of the season. We’re going to have some opportunities to play some really good basketball teams, and our schedule here starts out just bang-bang-bang-bang-bang, right in a row. We’re going to get a ton of games in, so we’re going to have to be ready to go and really compete and find that big W we’re really looking for that kind of gives us the confidence that we belong.”

Washington will have its work cut out for it, as they’ll face the 10th-ranked team in Class 1A in the Notre Dame Nikes. The Washington boys will be looking for their third straight win, but the Demons have lost three of their four non-conference games in their 5-4 start. While senior Ethan Patterson continues to score in bunches and is putting up more than 17 points per contest, head coach Collin Stark says the entire offense has looked sharper of late.

“Just credit to the guys of finding the open man and making the extra pass,” Stark says, “taking what [the defense] gave us and just executing those sets and taking advantage of them.”

Washington takes on a Notre Dame team that is 8-3. The Demons meet Burlington Notre Dame, and you can hear coverage of the doubleheader on 106.1 FM KCII. It all starts with the Washington HyVee Pregame Show at 5:30 this evening.