By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

PORTLAND, Ore.–  It was, for all the Basketball puns intended, a good rebound from their Wednesday defeat to Liberty in the Pacific Office Automation Holiday Classic.

Coming off of their 58-48 defeat to Liberty Wednesday, the South Salem Girls basketball team came into Thursday afternoon’ game with Central Catholic with a little more focus and poise.  Settling down for their 51-30 win of the Rams to wrap up the PIL-hosted event with a 2-1 record over the course of the three-day event.

“It was definitely an eye-opener because we kind of went into it (Wednesday) thinking that we’re going to beat them, which is not the way to go about it,” Lexi Dalton starts.  “Once that kind of happened, we were like ‘ok, we can’t underestimate teams no matter how we beat them before’. 

“So we just need to focus more like we did today and not focus on their record or anything like that.”

The Saxons pride themselves on their defense points Dalton, saying it’s their offense that they can continue to improve upon.  In Thursday’s game, it was a nice ebb-and-flow between their offense and defense.

Their defense continued to be solid, creating stops and opportunities that their offense turned into points on this day.  Maggie Lapray scored 13 of her 15 points in the first quarter.  Dalton with 13 points and Maddie Dustin with a team-high 18 points carried the load over the course of the second and third quarters offensively as South Salem built themselves a 49-21 lead going into the fourth quarter.

Saxons’ bench came in and contributed and continued what the starters started as they had overall a team effort out on the court as they wrap up non-league play January 7 at Oregon City.

“Everyone on the team contributed.  The bench came in and got minutes.  We played a full four quarters and everyone helped with every minute they got.  It was a lot of effort by everybody constantly,” Dustin said.  “Everyone can see how we can play and know what we need to do.  If we can continue that, then we’ll be great.”

Tip-off against the Pioneers will be at 6pm with Mountain Valley Conference play starting January 11 at Mountain View.

Photos By Jeremy McDonald