Just on the heels of two big wins the previous weekend the Warriors took care of business back home against Lincoln Southeast 76-59. With the win, Westside improves to a record of 17-4 including a six game streak. Over that span they’ve knocked off two top ten teams including former number one Millard North on the road, the second time this season they have done that feat after knocking off Lincoln Southwest in January.
For Head coach Jim Simons it’s defense that has allowed the Warriors to rattle off wins. “We are getting better, we’ve been playing better defense,” Simons said. “I thought we played really well over the week and our game on Friday against Millard North was our best defensive game of the year.”
In the game versus the Knights both teams came out of the games red hot combining for 50 points in the first eight minutes including back to back four point plays in the final ten seconds by Westside’s Kai Fredrick and Lincoln Southeast’s Jayvis Johnson. The second quarter was a complete flip with only 14 combined points including a five point quarter from the Warriors in which they only made two field goals in those eight minutes which put the Knights up by four going into halftime.
Westside came out hot in the second half outscoring the Knights 21-9 in the third quarter with a flurry of baskets from all around the court mainly coming from forward Emre Gedik in the third. Westside slammed the door on the Knights in the fourth scoring another 25 points and playing suffocating defense to allow the warriors to take the big victory.
Coach Simons gives his thoughts about what led them to victory in the second half “I think our defensive intensity and defensive focus improved after halftime.” Simons said “We talked about how they are a great three point shooting team. We told our guys that we needed to run them off the three point line.”
Westside played an all around fantastic game both offensively and defensively. The Warriors were led by Gedik who went 90% from the field scoring 23 points while snagging nine rebounds, Donnie Barfield also had a monster game with the usual 27% three point shooter going 4/4 from beyond the arc on route to a 22 point day, London Dada also added on 16 points and five rebounds.
For Lincoln Southeast it was the fourth loss in a row, after starting the season 8-0 they have lost eight of their past 11 games now with a record of 11-8. The Knights were led in the game by Freshman Jayvis Johnson who had 17 points with three other Knights cracking double digit points as well.
Westside still has a few more games left to go in the regular season with the most important games coming up this week facing a scrappy Buena Vista team on the road then the next day going to Grand Island to play a neutral site game against the 17-4 Lincoln North Star Navigators in the Hartland Hoops Classic. Both teams are in the top five with the Navigators at fourth in Class A led by standout Junior Jordan Castor who averages nearly 17 points per game. Westside is currently number one in the standings with the two huge number one road wins. It will be a brawl to determine not only the best team of that day but also how it will shake up district seedings and matchups after the regular season ends.
Simons is excited for the opportunity to play the Navigators.
“We’re excited for it, it’s going to be a great event, it’s great to play in an arena,” Simons said. “North Star is very good and we haven’t played them very much, so both of us were open to the matchup when the event organizers came up to us in April last year.”
