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Marci Johnston goes back up with an offensive rebound during the Cowgirls game against the Summit Storm on Tuesday. Johnston finished the game with eight points and six rebounds as the Cowgirls lost 57-52 to the Storm.
The Summit Storm broke a seven-game losing streak with a 57-52 victory over the Crook County Cowgirls Tuesday night.
“Sometimes you just go cold at the wrong time,” said Crook County head coach Dave Johnson following the game. “We just have to keep working on that.”
Playing in front of their home crowd on senior night, the Cowgirls struggled to make shots early in the game as they fell behind 6-1 in the game’s opening minutes. Summit still led by five, 12-7, at the end of the quarter.
Both teams switched their offenses into high gear in the second quarter. The Storm built a 22-11 lead before the Cowgirls came storming back. Crook County outscored Summit 22-20 in the quarter to trail by just three points, 32-29 at the half.
“We had a great run to get back in it,” Johnson said.
The Storm
Kaylee Solomon goes to the basket over Summit’s Sarah Edwards during the Cowgirls basketball game on Tuesday. Solomon scored nine points in the game, however, the Storm came from behind in the fourth quarter to take the victory.
The Cowgirls seemingly took control of the game early in the fourth quarter. Makayla Lindburg grabbed an offensive rebound and scored with 5:44 remaining in the game to put Crook County ahead 47-43.
However, Summit called time and switched to a 2-3 zone defense. The change worked as the Cowgirls went without a field goal for more than five minutes. Summit went on a 10-0 scoring run to open up a 53-47 lead.
The Cowgirls went to a full-court press, and began to foul the Storm, and Summit made just enough free throws to hold on for the win.
Jessie Loper finally broke the Cowgirls field goal drought with a three-point goal with 16 seconds remaining in the game, but it was too little, too late, as the Cowgirls went down to defeat for the third consecutive game.
“I think we did a real nice job battling back and putting ourselves in position to win the game,” Johnson said. “Then they made some shots and we didn’t at the end. We had great looks at the basket. If we had been able to knock down some of them, the outcome would have been different.”
Loper, who finished with 11 points, was the only Cowgirl to finish in double figures. Kaylee Solomon added nine points, while Kayla Morgan and Marci Johnston added eight points.
Raja Char led the Storm in scoring with 19 points, while Kristen Parr added 17, and Shannon Patterson finished with 13 points.
Led by seven rebounds from Loper and six from Johnston, the Cowgirls outrebounded the Storm 35-31. In addition, Crook County committed five fewer turnovers than Summit. However, the Storm converted on 13 of 22 free throws, while the Cowgirls were just 4-9 from the free throw line.
The Cowgirls had 13 more field goal attempts than the Storm, but hit on just 35 percent of their attempts, going 23 for 65 from the floor.
With the victory, the Storm is now 7-12 on the year, while the Cowgirls fell to 11-8.
The Cowgirls, who were as high as 12th in the OSAA power rankings less than two weeks ago, have fallen all the way to 20th in the latest rankings.
Crook County is back in action tonight when they travel to Portland to take on the Roosevelt Roughriders in the final Special District I game of the year. The Cowgirls won the previous meeting between the two teams 62-35. Should the Cowgirls win tonight, they will be 2-0 in league play, and will have sewed up a play-in game.
Crook County will play their final regular season home game of the year on Saturday when they take on the Mountain View Cougars in a 3:30 p.m. contest.
Tuesday, January 31
at Crook County
Summit (57) — Raja Char 19, Parr 17, Patterson 13, Edwards 8, Trejo, Hasenoehrl, Powers, Wettig. Totals 20 13-22 57
Crook County (52) — Jessie Loper 11, Solomon 9, Morgan 8, Johnston 8, Buswell 6, Lindburg 5, Ovens 2, Saenz 2, Walker 1, Martin, Apperson, McKenzie. Totals 23 4-9 52.
Summit 12 20 11 14 — 57
Crook County 7 22 13 10 — 52
Three-point goals — Summit: Patterson 2, Char, Parr; Crook County: Loper, Morgan.