Silverdale's Libby Cline looks to pass against Polk County's Hannah Burgess.
photo by M.A. Locke
The Silverdale Lady Seahawks and the Polk County Wildkittens kicked off action in the annual Silverdale Thankgiving Tournament on Monday afternoon at the spacious and beautiful Silverdale Center with the Lady Seahawks advancing with a 34-15 victory.
No offense to either team, but this was one ugly basketball game between two teams who are obviously much better than they showed. There was an abundance of silly turnovers, ill-timed fouls and passes thrown to who knows who. And thank goodness that field goal percentages were not available because those percentages may have been in negative numbers.
Both coaches agreed that it was painful to watch, but as far as Silverdale coach Victor Underwood, he and his team will just take a win and move forward.
“A win is a win, but that was some ugly basketball,” he said matter of factly shortly after the game finally ended.
“We missed way too many layups and had too many turnovers. We did a great job defensively, but we have to learn how to convert good defensive plays into buckets on the other end and we just didn’t do that tonight. We got in a little foul trouble in the first half, but the bottom line is that we still have a whole lot of work to do. The good news is that it’s still November,” Underwood said after his team had improved to 3-1 overall.
Polk County coach Hollie Lowe was almost ashamed to talk about her team’s lack of execution on both ends of the floor.
“I can promise you that we’re better than a team that only scored four points in the first half,” she began outside the Polk County dressing room following the game.
“It just wasn’t our day as we missed a lot of shots that we normally make, but we just didn’t take advantage of our opportunities in other areas. It’s tough to win against anybody when you only score 15 points. The good news is that we get to play again tomorrow with hopes of having a better day,” she concluded.
Sophomore Kinsley Owen sank a 3 from the key for the first points of the game at the 5:03 mark of the first quarter and the Lady Seahawks proceeded to score the next six points for a 9-0 lead with three minutes left in the opening stanza.
Abbi Thompson scored on a layup for Polk with 1:03 showing and those were the only points for the Wildkittens in that opening stanza.
Things didn’t get any better for the girls from Benton in the second quarter as the only points they scored were single free throws by Anastasia Keith and Hannah Burgess.
The difference was 20-4 at intermission.
Things didn’t get much better in the second half as Silverdale enjoyed its biggest lead of 22 points when Owen scored on a drive down the lane with 41 seconds left in the third for a 31-9 advantage.
Owen sank the second of two free throws with seven minutes to play for another similar lead at 32-10, but the Lady Seahawks only added one more bucket from Kelsie Johnson as the game finally came to a close.
Owen was the only player in double figures as she scored 11 points to lead Silverdale while teammate Johnson followed with eight.
Burgess was tops for Polk with four points while Ally Combs scored three.
Silverdale also had an unofficial 29-20 advantage in rebounds as Owen snagged eight for the Lady Seahawks while sophomore Braylee Raby grabbed seven. Madison Lewis and Thompson both grabbed four for the Wildkittens.
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POLK COUNTY
|
2
|
2
|
6
|
5
|
-- 15
|
|
SILVERDALE
|
11
|
9
|
11
|
3
|
-- 34
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POLK CO. (15) – Stone 1, Evans, Combs 3, Lewis 2, Taylor, Burgess 4, Thompson 2, Farr 2, Keith 1, Sheldon, England.
SILVERDALE (34) – Canter 4, Bledsoe 4, K. Littrell 2, Raby 5, Rogers, Kinsley Owen 11, Inman, A. Littrell, Johnson 8, Cline.
3-Point Goals: Polk Co. none; Silverdale 1 (Owen).
(Email John Hunt at nomarathonmoose@gmail.com)