This year during the annual “Warsader” game, the Warriors came out with the win over Marian, 60-47. Their highest scorer of the game was Kimora Jenkins with 14 points. With the Warriors being ranked seventh and the Crusaders ranked eighth in the poll, this was going to be a good match up. Though Marian’s ranking may seem low, they have great players that can get to the basket and score buckets. Gueryn Kay, a sophomore for Westside, was matched up with Marian’s lead scorer and explains how she was able to slow her down.
“When told I would be guarding Alivia Kuhn [Marian’s lead scorer] I knew I would have to stay out of foul trouble and force her to have no easy shots,” Kay said.
As a team, the Warriors performed well to pull off this win. Kay says that Marian’s crowd plays a big part in getting in the opposing team’s head. Kay said that they did a good job blocking them out and playing their game. Lucy Pocras, a junior on the team, agrees with this.
“We did well on capitalizing on their mistakes, played really good defense on their lead scorers, and it helped that they were missing free throws,” Pocras said. “We also did well staying composed while we played as their gigantic student section was in our ears.”
With ups, there are always some downs as no matter what there is always something to improve. Kay says that they need to work on keeping their defense together and both Kay and Pocras agree that they need to work on avoiding giving the other team easy shots.
“We need to work on finishing at the rim, as a lot of shots fell in, but easy shots that should have gone in didn’t,” Pocras said. “We need to make sure we don’t get sped up by the other team and play at our own pace.”
While the Warriors were preparing for this match-up, the players did certain things to prepare for the game and make a plan. Since no team is the same, the Warriors came in with a specific plan to win the game.
“ To prepare for the game we made sure to know who the scorers on the team were, and tried to tire Marian out,” Kay said.
During the third quarter, the Warriors were able to go on a run and outscore Marian by a large margin. Pocras explains why going on runs in a game are so important and why they are so vital to a victory.
“We knew we had to win, and having a big scoring run is a vital part of the game as everyone has their runs, but to win we needed to have a better scoring run,” Pocras said.
Now that the Warriors have won this game, they are on a four game win streak, which is the longest they have had this season. They will be able to use these wins as something to motivate them as they know they can see what they are capable of. Kay explains what this means to her as an individual player and also as a team.
“Winning the Warsader contributed a big part to giving our team more confidence and showed us that when we play as a team we play better,” Kay said. “For me knowing that my teammates and coaches trust me to guard and get stops on some of the star players in the state makes me want to work harder and gives me more confidence offensively.”
Pocras agrees with this idea, but she connects this idea more to the future, like metros, districts, and states. All these wins that they are able to get now will be crucial to their seeding and whether they get to play at home or not.
“We know we need to be one of the top teams to host a district game, so we will use these wins as momentum to continue to perform at our highest level,” Pocras said. “We have had a pretty difficult schedule so far, so having this winning streak really boosts our confidence as a team as we can compete with the best teams in the state.”
The Warriors will look to keep winning their games and keep playing the best that they can. Their next game will be on Friday Jan. 24 at home at 5:30 p.m.