St. Joseph too much for Parkersburg, 73-56

St. Joseph’s Bailee Adkins handles the ball during Thursday’s win at Parkersburg.

 

PARKERSBURG, W.Va. — There was a fairly strong consensus ahead of Thursday’s showdown between Saint Joseph Central and Parkersburg that the Irish and Big Reds were the top two teams in the state.

If so, St. Joseph showed there’s clear separation from the top spot down as the Irish built a 16-point halftime lead en route to a 73-56 victory at the PHS Fieldhouse.

“We’re kind of a veteran team right now with a couple young kids that we’ve added, but they know the system and they know what we like to do,” St. Joseph coach Shannon Lewis said. “They’ve been running it for years and they play well together. They’ll make the extra pass most of the time and look up the floor and get it to the right person. 

“If we have an advantage inside, we’ll get it there and if they collapse, we’ll kick it out. We have some great shooters and some great ball handlers so it is hard to pressure us.”

Dena Jarrells hit two of her team’s four 3-pointers in the first quarter, pacing St. Joseph (9-1) to a 22-12 lead after eight minutes of play.

The Big Reds (8-1) closed to within 26-20 nearing the midway point of the second quarter, before Abby Lee and Paige Shy connected on consecutive triples to double the Irish lead. 

One free throw from Shay Kirby and two free throws from Taylor Miller allowed Parkersburg to get back within nine, but the Irish ended the half on a critical 7-0 run to go into the break leading 39-23. The St. Joseph surge that allowed it to open up the game’s biggest lead to that point featured inside baskets from Bailee Adkins, Nene Hickman and Shy.

“When you have shooters and some kids that can fly around a little bit, you can reel off six or seven pretty quick and that’s what we seem to be doing most of the year,” Lewis said. “As long as we stay unselfish, I think it’s going to be a good year.”

While the Irish hit six first half 3s and had seven different players make a field goal, their defense was even more impressive as St. Joseph forced 10 Parkersburg turnovers and held the Big Reds to 6-of-23 shooting through two quarters.

“All the credit goes to them. I thought they outplayed us in every facet of the game,” Parkersburg coach Scott Cozzens said. “Their energy level was way more than ours and that’s a little disappointing, especially at home.”

The Irish scored the first five points of the second half, before the Big Reds used a 6-0 run to pull to within 15. Parkersburg’s Maggie Richards scored all seven of her points in the final few minutes of the third quarter, allowing the Big Reds to face a 58-44 deficit entering the fourth.

The Irish’s Hannah Roberts scored inside for the first points of the fourth quarter and Lee followed with a 3 to up the lead to 19 as St. Joseph led by at least 14 throughout the entirety of the final period.

“We battled a little bit at times in the second half, but the first half was just some of the worst basketball we played all year,” Cozzens said. “But you have to give them a lot of credit for that. They turned us over a lot. We rushed our shots and I don’t know how many layups we missed.”

Shy made 6-of-12 field goals with four 3s and 5-of-8 free throws to finish with 21 points in the win. Adkins added 15 points, seven assists and four rebounds. Roberts added 11 points and six boards for the Irish, while Jarrells and Lee scored eight points apiece in the balanced effort.

Kirby led the Big Reds with 21 points and six rebounds in the loss. No other PHS player scored more than seven points as the Big Reds shot 33 percent (17-of-51) and committed 21 turnovers in their first loss of the season.





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