Winslow girls snap four-game losing streak

WINSLOW – Before the Christmas break, the Winslow Lady Bulldogs opened the 3A East girls basketball race with a 1-0 record.

Since then, Winslow had dropped four games, including three region games entering last Friday’s contest with Alchesay.

The Bulldogs (3-11, 2-4 in 3A East play) fell into an early hole, but they responded in a big way in the second period before outlasting the visiting Lady Falcons (4-10, 1-5) by a 57-49 count.

“We really needed this win,” Winslow coach Janeen Barton said. “This is definitely a huge development in terms of our teams’ confidence. I feel like that’s what the girls had been lacking the past few weeks.

“Obviously, when you lose that many games their confidence started to drop,” she added. “This game will definitely build their confidence in themselves in what they can do as individuals and what we can do as a team.”

To snap its four-game losing streak, Winslow hit a barrage of 3s in the second stanza that erased a five-point, first-quarter deficit.

Junior guard Kaitlyn Belone jumpstarted Winslow’s offense by nailing three treys, including back-to-back ones for a 22-15 cushion.

“We came out a little slow,” said Belone, who led all-scorers with 19 points. “We were kind of playing scared, too, but we just pulled together. We started to talk more, and we just ran our offense to get that lead.”

The Bulldogs pushed that margin to 25-15 after freshman Emiah Yazzie hit the team’s fourth trey in said quarter.

Alchesay, however, cut into that 10-point gap and got within 29-23 at the break.

The Falcons picked up where they left off and opened the third period on a 5-0 run. Junior guard Lenea Lavender nailed a 3 while an inside bucket by senior post Ramona Gregg pulled Alchesay within 29-28 with 6:50 left in the quarter.

The Bulldogs, however, scored 10 of the next 13 points with junior guard Tatum Henling scoring half of her dozen points in that sequence as Winslow opened up a 41-31 cushion with 2:49 to go.

The Barton-coached team capped the quarter on another 10-3 run as Winslow entered the fourth with a commanding 51-34 advantage.

The margin hovered around 17 points with two minutes left before Alchesay used a late 9-0 run to make the final score 57-49 in favor of Winslow.

Winslow had three players in double figures headed by Belone’s 19 points.

“Kaitlyn had been struggling offensively, and she needed a game like this,” Barton said. “She took some really good shots, and she became a factor in this game.”

Freshman Emiah Yazzie added 13 while Henling had 12 and freshman Ayla Curley helped out with nine.

“My teammates did really good tonight,” Belone said. “Ayla played really hard, and she stepped up her game. She plays JV, too, so this was a big step for her.”

“Ayla came out of her shell tonight,” Barton added. “We’ve been working with her during the summer. She’s been building her confidence and a lot of that started in the practice with the girls encouraging her.”

Alchesay was led by Lavender as she finished with 17 points, which included five treys. The Falcons also received 11 from junior post Alyssa Jim and 10 from Gregg.

Winslow is looking to build on its eight-point win as they will travel to No. 7 Show Low on Tuesday and at No. 2 Snowflake on Thursday. The Bulldogs will finish out the week with a home game with No. 20 Blue Ridge on Friday.

“This was a really big win for us,” Barton said. “It’ll help bump us in the rankings because we want to make the playoffs.”

In last week’s Arizona Interscholastic Association’s statewide polls, Winslow was ranked No. 24. The new polls will come out on Tuesday afternoon.

“We would like to be (ranked) a little higher,” Barton said. “Our goal is to get up a little higher. We have games with Show Low, Snowflake and Blue Ridge this week.

“They already have one game on us, so we need to reduce our turnovers and box out,” Barton added. “We can’t be intimidated by them. We got to rebound, and we got attack the basket.”

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