Rock Point girls shake off rust against El Captain
Lady Cougar Pashen Johnson (23) drives the ball against El Capitan’s Nola Hammon (20) on Friday night in Rock Point, Ariz. (Times photo – Ravonelle Yazzie)
Lady Cougar Pashen Johnson (23) drives the ball against El Capitan’s Nola Hammon (20) on Friday night in Rock Point, Ariz. (Times photo – Ravonelle Yazzie)
ROCK POINT, Ariz.
For one half of play, the Rock Point girls’ basketball team had to fight through some ragged play on Friday night.
The Lady Cougars hadn’t played since Dec. 20 and that layover was pretty evident, as they could not connect with their shots on their home floor.
Rock Point missed seven shots from point-blank range as they led El Captain 10-8 in the opening quarter.
In the second period, the Cougars picked up the tempo and put 13 points for a 23-12 lead at the break.
“We were a little rusty tonight and it was because we didn’t have a game in three weeks,” Rock Point coach Marlla Begay said. “We started out slow so we had to stick with the fundamentals.”
The fifth-year coach said she expected her team to come out slow but in the second half her key players stepped it up as her team cruised to a 51-21 win to improve its conference record to 3-0 and 6-2 for the year.
“They all played their roles,” Begay said, while adding that she wanted to her bench extensively.
“I go seven players deep but for this game the J.V. players got into the game,” she said.
After being held to four points in the opening half, senior guard Pashen Johnson found her groove as she keyed a 22-4 run in the third quarter by scoring nine of her team-best 13 points.
“We didn’t play as well as we wanted but the main thing we did was play defense,” Johnson said. “We did a lot of running during the winter break and we mainly worked on our footwork and that helped us play defense.”
Highway 264,
I-40, WB @ Winslow