GRANITE CITY – Jaylen Townsend and Sydney Harris scored 17 points each while Kylie Burg had 10 and Quierra Love and Maddy Stephen had 9 and Megan Silvey 8 as the Edwardsville girls’ basketball team opened the 2018-19 season with an 80-11 win over Granite City Tuesday night at Granite City’s Memorial Gymnasium.
Morgan Hulme added 6 points for the Tigers and Katelynne Roberts had 4 to round out a balanced scoring attack. Harris also contributed 6 boards in her eight minutes of play, quite a beginning for a freshman. The Tigers never trailed, building a 22-5 lead after one quarter, and held the Warriors without a point in the entire second quarter in recording the win.
“I thought we did some really good things,” said Tiger coach Lori Blade. “We were very unselfish, which was good to see, and I thought after we made an adjustment and kind of put something on the line, we rebounded a little bit better. We’re not going to out jump a lot of teams, so we have to position, and have enough self-discipline to go and get hits off the boards. Hopefully, we created some good habits, and we’ll carry that over, but like I said, they were very unselfish, ran the floor well and did some very good things.”
The Tigers were able to get many of their players into the game, and all executed well in different situations.
“We don’t go by the score, we go by execution and seeing what we’re going to get,” Blade said. “And some kids got put into position where they’re not banging on each other every day, so that’s a good plus. But we did get to see some kids in a game situation, which was good to see, who’s going to respond to what and being able to run some offensive sets. So it was a good start for us, and we get to see some different things. But overall, I was really pleased. We got a lot of kids time in, and like I’ve told the kids, they’ll start separating themselves a little bit, just on who’s going to have the discipline to do their jobs, and who’s going to play defense, and who’s going to board.”
The Warriors’ lack of size and missing a few key parts hurt Granite throughout the game.
“It’s another team where we’re missing a few key components,” said Warrior coach Whitney Sykes-Rogers, “so that hurt us a little bit. But we panicked. And they’re a very good team, so starting the year against them is a tough test, but we know that we’re not going to face probably anybody better. So it kind of gives you a benchmark of where we need to be.”
Granite did have some positive things during the game, and Sykes-Rogers now knows on what the Warriors need to work on.
“We had some positive things happen,” Sykes-Rogers said. “I think mainly, our defense, it needs a lot of work, and we don’t have a lot of size. That’s an issue, and when we’re playing a zone, they just exploited it so much. So we have to be just better at that because the size is going to kill us eventually. So we just have to be more active, talk to each other more, and those things are fixable. Some of the stuff is not like more athleticism; that’s not going to be us. So we have to rely a little bit more on each other than other teams might have to.”
The Tigers scored the first seven points of the game, with Love and Townsend leading the way before Toni Rush scored Granite’s first basket. Edwardsville then went on a run, with Love and Townsend scoring the next ten points to make it 17-2 before the Warriors were able to score again. Burg then hit a three and Love a long two, sandwiched between an Azaria Moore free throw, to take a 22-5 lead at quarter time.
Edwardsville outscored the Warriors 31-0 in the second term, like Townsend, Madelyn Stephen and Morgan Hulme all hit free throws to extend the Tiger lead to 28-5. Megan Silvey scored on a nice drive and Harris hit a three to further extend the lead to 33-5, and Townsend, Harris, Burg, Katelynne Roberts and Stephen all scored during the remainder of the quarter to help extend the Tiger lead to 53-5 at halftime.
Stephen and Townsend both scored to open up the second half before Erika Hurst scored to make it 57-7. It was all Tigers the rest of the period, with Burg, Silvey, Townsend, and Harris all scoring to give Edwardsville a 71-7 lead after three. In the fourth quarter, Alex Powell and Hurst were able to score for the Warriors, but Hulme, Harris, and Love all scored to make the final 80-11.
Burg and Harris both got considerable playing time, and both performed very well.
“They’re going to,” Blade said. “That’s the good part; we’ve got enough incoming freshmen and new kids that it’s good to see Maria (Smith) get some minutes and get her legs under her a little bit. But Kylie’s going to get it. She’ll get it, and she’ll be a good plus for us, for sure. But she has absolutely been a pleasure to coach so far, comes in with a great attitude and just wants to learn, and wants to play, and she’ll play hard for us.
“She got on the boards a little bit,” Blade said of Harris. “She can score and she’s going to do some good things for us, without a doubt.”
The Warriors are playing their first season as an independent after leaving the Southwestern Conference, and Sykes-Rogers thinks that once her pieces fall together, the Warriors should be good.
“I think once we get all of our pieces together, it’ll be better,” Sykes-Rogers said. “Again, we don’t have to face some of those teams in the conference, which are very good basketball teams, and we get to face some people we don’t normally see. So it’ll be a lot different of a season, because of just the teams we face. So I can’t say what exactly it’s going to be until it really happens. But I’m looking forward to it because I feel like more of the teams are on our level, and more where we can at least compete. So I think our girls will feel better once it gets going, too.”
The Tigers will play in the O’Fallon Thanksgiving tournament, where they’ll first face Chatham Glenwood Saturday afternoon at 1 p.m., then play against Hazelwood Central, Danville Schlarman and Normal Community. The Warriors are at Freeburg on Thursday night, then have Thanksgiving off before facing Father McGivney Catholic on the road Nov. 29.
Dan Brannan also contributed to this story.
