Meeker girls win first game under new coach

MEEKER | The lady Cowboys’ basketball team won its first game of the season in the first round of the White River Electric Cowboy Shootout last weekend but Meeker fell behind early in the next two games and although they made them close, the lady Cowboys lost both and finished fourth. Meeker played Coal Ridge Tuesday and will not see action again until they host Grand Valley Dec. 16.
“It was really fun to see where the girls’ strengths were,” Meeker’s new girls’ basketball coach Jamie Rogers said after the tournament. “Now we know what direction to go with each girl.”
Coach Rogers got her first varsity career win when her team defeated the Aspen Skiers by 20 points, 52-32 in the first round of the tournament but then lost 44-37 in the semifinals to Moffat County before dropping another seven point game to Cedaredge (42-35).
“In the Aspen game, Halle (Ahrens) had nine steals and 14 points,” coach Rogers said of one of her seniors. “She created lots of turnovers on top and Megan (Shelton) and Reese (Pertile) had a big game underneath, getting rebounds.
Coach Rogers said senior point guard Maggie Phelan kept the girls “grounded and calm,” while she referred to Peyton Burke, Sierra Williams and Anna Walsh as “spark plugs,” for the team.
In the semifinal game against Moffat County, the lady Cowboys trailed 3-11 after the first quarter and they were down by 11 at the end of the first half before coming back in the second half to make the game closer. Meeker also fell behind Cedaredge by 13, before coming back to pull within four in the fourth quarter.
“We need to figure out how to come out and be as strong in the first quarter as we are the rest of the game,” coach Rogers said. “I love how the girls never got down, they kept fighting their way back in the second half.”
Rogers was thankful and appreciative of everyone’s help in making the 2016 WREA Cowboy Shootout another success.
“The tournament was really fun but it takes a lot of work, many volunteers and the whole community to get it done,” coach Rogers said.