Columbia Basin hoops teams struggle in Saturday games

Pateros 53, Moses Lake Christian Academy 27; Highland 35, Warden 19; Cascade 62, Royal 25; Oroville 62, Soap Lake 16; ACH 62, Sprague-Harrington 23

PATEROS — All year it has been a battle of attrition with a minimal margin for error when it comes to Moses Lake Christian Academy’s girls basketball team.

Boasting a roster of just six players the Lions travelled to Pateros Saturday down a player as junior Kristina Firouzi was ruled out due to illness.

With no subs, the Lions fell 53-27 at Pateros, in a game that saw the hosts pull away in their North Central Washington league game once the Academy was hit with late foul trouble.

The Lions (3-3, 0-2) led 6-5 after the first quarter but trailed 16-9 by halftime.

Rachel Verhage led the Lions with 10 points and 10 rebounds.

“In the second quarter Rachel picked up her third foul and that made her tentative,” Lions’ coach Bryce McPartland said. “Before that she was holding Pateros’ main inside player Lorrie Mattson to nothing offensively. After she got that third foul Rachel got tentative. Mattson ended up with 26 points.”

By the end of the third quarter, three Lions players picked up their fourth foul and Pateros went on a run to take a 32-13 lead with eight minutes remaining.

“Once they saw we had players with foul trouble they just put the ball on the floor and took it to the hoop and did it effectively,” McPartland said. “They took advantage of the situation and we didn’t do a good job to respond or do the things we could have done to put ourselves in position to score a few more points.”

Highland 35, Warden 19

WARDEN — Following a strong offensive showing at the Moses Lake Christian Academy Christmas Tournament, the Warden Cougars found themselves off-target most of the night in a 35-19 home loss to Highland on Saturday.

“We just couldn’t get a basket to go in,” Warden coach Todd Kisler said. “It was such a struggle to see us do so well defensively and turn around and not make shots. Highland played decent defense but we got our 50 shots and they wouldn’t go in.”

Warden (1-9) trailed 7-2 after the first quarter and 21-8 at the intermission.

Emma Bisnett led Warden with five points and ten rebounds.

“Our defense is getting better, especially our communication is getting better,” Kisler said. “We are holding teams to one shot and we have been outrebouding teams in our losses.”

Cascade 62, Royal 25

CASCADE — Minus three starters, the Royal Lady Knights fell 62-25 at Cascade on Saturday night.

One starter was out of town in order to take a college entrance exam and the other two were absent for family holiday trips.

“We just had too many kids playing in the game that weren’t ready to play at that level,” Royal coach Brock Anderson said.

Leslie Brown continued her yeoman’s work for Royal, scoring 22 points and grabbing 11 rebounds for the Lady Knights (1-7, 0-2).

“She has been handling this season very well and has matured a lot,” Anderson said. “She did everything, which is a testimony to her that she can. But we need the others’ helps now with 10 more league games to go.”

Oroville 62, Soap Lake 16

OROVILLE — Soap Lake’s struggles continued with a 62-16 loss at Oroville in the Eagles’ 2B North Central Washington league opener on Saturday night.

Samantha Marthini, who returned from an injury prior to the holiday break, led Soap Lake (0-5, 0-1) with four points.

“We played poorly and we aren’t executing and that’s my fault,” Soap Lake coach Bill Sarver said. “This is a very intelligent group of young ladies that can do it. There are a lot of things, I, and the team need to do better and get us back to where we can compete and win the games that we should.”

ACH 62, Sprague-Harrington 23

SPRAGUE — After dropping their first game of the season it was expected to see Almira/Coulee-Hartline attempt to bounce back with a vengeance.

Did they ever.

Behind an 18-2 first quarter the Lady Warriors cruised to a 62-23 win Saturday night at Sprague-Harrington.

ACH (9-1) built its lead to 34-9 by halftime and never looked back in the victory.

Nikki Osborne recorded 16 points and 14 rebounds while Madeline Isaak recorded 11 points and five steals for ACH.