Lady Mustangs dropped pair to league foes
The West Grand Lady Mustangs dropped a pair of league contests this past weekend to fall to 1-3 in Western Slope League play.
In a thriller played in Kremmling on Friday night, the Mustangs lost
to Vail Christian, 35-33, a game that ended when West Grand was
unable to get off a shot with the time winding down to zero.
“Vail Christian did a good job of taking away our strengths,” said Coach Larry Banman, “and I didn’t do a good job of finding alternatives to help us be successful.”
The Mustangs did put forth a tenacious effort in the final moments as Coach Banman used almost entirely different lineups as the teams
switched from offense to defense.
The Mustangs had a couple of shots to tie or win the game, but they
were just unable to put all the pieces together at the right time.
“As always, the girls played extremely hard,” Banman said. “We just
could never quite get over the hump. I also want to commend Vail
Christian. They are playing better and better.”
Cecil and Melissa Kraker led the way for West Grand with eight points
apiece. Maddie Roller, Hannah Howell and Destry Heide all scored four
points, Taylor Pesch chipped in with three fourth-quarter points and
Jessica Raecke added two to the effort.
Howell was the leading rebounder with eight while Heide grabbed seven caroms.
On Saturday, the Mustangs ran into a buzzsaw called Paonia, in a game that the Eagles won, 71-35.
“There is a reason they are the top-ranked team in the state,” Banman said. “They run well, the defend hard, they are very deep and they are relentless in their attack on both ends of the floor.”
The Eagles raced to a 30-5 first quarter lead before the Mustangs make a couple of adjustments to stem the onslaught a bit.
The Mustangs were able to outscore the Eagles by one point in the
second and fourth quarters. The first and third quarters, however,
were clearly owned by Paonia.
Howell led the team in scoring with 10 points, Kraker added eight to
the effort and Heide scored six points, all from the free throw line.
Also scoring for the Mustangs were Cecil, Erin Beason, Raecke and
Chyenne Sims.
“There certainly were times when we rose to the level of competition
and played well,” Banman said. “That was the positive we can take fromthis game. We know what it takes to play at the level, the key is
finding a way to sustain that effort for an entire game.”
Grayson Pipher led the team in scoring with 14 points, Jordyn Rienks
scored 12 and Shelby Cambell added 10 to the cause.
This week, the Mustangs played North Park on Tuesday night and
finished the week with a league game on Saturday against Rangely
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