Eastern Women's consistency gets win over Centrals
Competitiveness can be heard via shoes squeaking on the floor and grunts between the beats of a bouncing ball. Cheers, jeers, instructions and whistles filled up the air at STARplex tonight as the Women’s Central Lions faced up against the visiting Eastern Mavs.
Some will say the start sets the pace or was it how you finish? Four quarters of basketball must be played and as much as the Lions set the pace, the Mavs well and truly took over leading into the end of the first half. Steady shooting and execution in the first quarter saw the Centrals women engage the crowd and the competition. 2 free throws starting the scoring for Eastern, but then Centrals rattled off 8 in a row. Two minutes later after a bit of back-n-forth action Eastern dropped in 2 more free throws and we were off. Into the second and the scoring (free throws) ceased for Centrals with 4.31 to go in the half (having not scored a field goal since the opening seconds of the quarter). With the Mavs persisting with a ½ court trap shaky ball-handling for Centrals equated to 10 turnovers in the 2nd. Not letting up led to Hayley Wadforth & Rachel Hines combining for 3 steals each and short possessions for both teams. However the home side's brevity was not capped with points on the board in the 2nd & 3rd quarters. Centrals scored 23 in the first, 6 in the 2nd then 8 in the 3rd followed by 25 in the 4th. Eastern trended the other way with 16,30,31,17 points per quarter, respectively.
The second half was much of the same with Centrals never finding a clear path up the court.
3 Eastern starters ended with double digit points (Alex Wilson 26 + 11 rebounds, Kedeisha Kartinyeri 11 + 5 assists, and Jaimie Rock 10) plus 2 bench players doubling down (Brooke Bashan 15 & Rachel Hines 13 + 9 rebs). With Shayde Quintell adding 9pts, 8 rebs, 3 assists you see a total team effort. All up Eastern’s 34 bench points to Central’s 18 tells a tale of two teams to 1. Stir in an outstanding 63% shooting for the visitors and 22 turnovers all up for the Lions and a 62 - 94 score line is what you get.
Photo Credit: Tanya Fielding
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